THE ENGLISH PATIENT (1996)

Cast

Plot

Sweeping romantic drama of epic proportions. Fiennes's WWII pilot lays badly burned and in the care of an army nurse. As the unnamed, stiff-upper-lipped "English Patient" begins to recover, memories emerge of a past life as an archaeologist/cartographer in the Sahara, and a passionate affair with a married woman, Katharine. Though Anthony Minghella's adaptation of Michael Ondaatje's novel simplifies, jettisons and changes certain elements of the original story, it remains a rich, complex, entrancing piece of work. Part poignant romance, part suspenseful adventure, part enigmatic mystery, it's essentially a study in different responses to love and war, honour and betrayal, nationality and identity, falsehood and forgiveness. Needless to say, the performances are flawless as is the fluency, poetry and scale of Minghella's direction, John Seale's sensuous desert photography is superb, equally eloquent whether depicting boudoir intimacies, bomb-disposal skills, drunken dementia or a deadly sandstorm. Winner of nine Academy Awards.