Captain Corellis Mandolin (2001)

This is partly because De Bernieres’ book was exceptionally dense, characters and anecdotes spilling off every page. The romantic triangle plot was occasionally buried behind walls of eccentricity and violent war scenes. The film – logically – brings it to the fore, but it is in losing the texture of the novel that the holes in the plot begin to appear. Nicolas Cage, Penelope Cruz and Christian Bale are fine as the points of the triangle, while John Hurt provides scene-stealing support. Unfortunately, the English language script demands that all the characters attempt European accents, and with Greek, Italian, German and English vowels flying through the air you half expect the cast of ‘Allo ‘Allo to spring up with some lame double entendres.

However, if you can get past this (it is possible) and try to disregard the source material, the film quite good. The battle scenes in particular are very well done, pretty gruesome and suitably disturbing. As mentioned before, the scenes with John Hurt are invariably excellent, and Cage and Cruz are likable enough as the lovers. It’s not the book, but judged as a film in its own right, it’s an enjoyable romantic melodrama. (VH)