Mona Lisa | | Cast : | Bob Hoskins, Cathy Tyson, Michael Caine | | Director : | Neil Jordan | | Studio : | Criterion Collection | | Format : | Color, Closed-captioned, Widescreen | | Released Date : | June 13, 1986 | | DVD Released Date : | March 12, 2001 | | Language : | English (Dubbed), English (Original Language), English (Subtitled) | | Audience Rating : | R (Restricted) | | | BUY THIS DVD FROM AMAZON |
Customer Reviews
| Rating |  | | Date | June 27, 2005 | | Summary | Dreams Just Lie There, and They Die There | Content
 | It's a stretch to link the lyrics of Nat King Cole's recording with this movie and its title. Almost any ballad would have served. But it's no stretch at all to see why "Mona Lisa" became a sleeper hit, launched the career of writer-director Neil Jordan, and won Bob Hoskins an Oscar nomination. He plays an ill-tempered ex-con hired to chauffeur a call girl (Cathy Tyson) around to clients. That he will fall for her is a given; so are the tricks that screenwriter Jordan will play on them.
Hoskins and Tyson tool around London, tend to business, and bond. He is open and inquisitive, she is closed and secretive. What binds them is survival. Rarely has urban low-life been filmed as matter-of-factly as here. Sex for sale is the street currency and those who earn it are injured in ways mostly seen on their faces. The camera visits sordid sites never listed on tourist maps. Nevertheless, Jordan finds tenderness there, unlikely as it may be, just as John Huston found it aboard "The African Queen."
The movie takes a minute to pull you in and, unfortunately, more than that to keep you there, so difficult are the cockney accents. This DVD lists English subtitles on the case which are nowhere to be found on the menu; nor are any of the easy-to-obtain extras we expect from The Criterion Collection, although there is a Jordan-Hoskins commentary. But "Mona Lisa" is so strongly written, acted and directed that it doesn't need any enhancements to engage us while we are watching it.
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| Rating | | | Date | June 07, 2005 | | Summary | "Taxi Driver" meets "Fairy Tale Theatre" | Content
| Neil Jordan's brilliant British underworld fable is one of those films that actually improves with age. Bob Hoskins gives a subtly nuanced performance as a "thug with a heart of gold", just out of prison, who is immediately offered employment by his former boss, a devious London crimelord (Michael Caine, excellent as always) for whom he "took the fall" in the first place. Hoskins becomes the driver for a high class call girl (Cathy Tyson, in a remarkable debut performance) employed by Caine to service a select group of regular clients in discreet liaisons at posh hotels. Hoskins and Tyson get off to a tense, "oil and water" start, soon turning to begrudging mutual respect, which eventually mutates into something much more deep and meaningful (not what you're thinking). The story deliberately and masterfully builds into some surprising and amazing twists and turns. Hoskins and Tyson create absolute screen magic in every scene they share (like a streetwise Tracy and Hepburn). Not an altogether pleasant tale, but there is redemption, and something you don't see much in film these days-a perfect and believable ending. POSSIBLE SPOILER: For my fellow reviewer who billed his or her self sarcastically as a "philistine" who "didn't get it"- I find it amusing that you complain that you don't "want your face rubbed" in grim "reality" when you watch a film. Well, if you had observed the epilogue scene a little more carefully, you would realise that what you had just spent 100 minutes having your "face rubbed in" was not in fact "reality", but essentially an adult fairy tale! (Lest we forget, Neil Jordan's previous film was "Company of Wolves"-which was based not so subtly on "Little Red Riding Hood"!) A must for your collection.
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| Rating | | | Date | June 01, 2005 | | Summary | A Sordid, Brilliant Film With Three Great Performances | Content
| This is a sordid and at times brutal film, which also is sad and great. George (Bob Hoskins) is just out of prison, needs a job, and is assigned by the local crime lord, Mortwell (Michael Caine), to be the driver and, if needed, protector, for a high priced London call girl named Simone (Cathy Tyson). George is tough, straight forward and not too smart. His idea of getting to B from A is to simply go through whatever is in the way. He has an ex-wife who hates him, a teen-age daughter who doesn't know him, and it seems just one friend. He's just a foot soldier. Simone is tough, elegant, defensive, but George and she gradually develop a liking for each other based on...what? "Do they ever fall in love with you?" George asks her one night. "Sometimes," she says. "They fall for what they think I am." "What are you?" George asks. "What do you think I am?" she says. George looks at her, puzzled but dead serious. "A lady," he says. Almost without being aware of it he begins in an inarticulate way to fall in love.
As he takes Simone from assignment to assignment she begins insisting that he drive through King's Cross, a meat rack George calls it, where drugged up street walkers and their pimps loiter in the shadows and try to talk up business with any driver who slows down. Simone is looking for someone, a young prostitute she knew who had disappeared. Unwillingly, George agrees to help find the young woman. The search takes him into some of the worst sex establishments of Soho, where drugs and brutal pimps keep the girls, often underage, frightened and in line, and where a customer's taste for inflicting pain can be accomodated. In the background is Mortwell, a criminal who has turned drugs and rough sex into nothing more than a business. George finally finds Cathy, brings her back to Simone and discovers that there is all kinds of love in this world. The conclusion is violent, sad, and finally somewhat hopeful for George.
Three great performances make this movie. Bob Hoskins brings an almost unbelievable combination of violence and honesty to the part. He makes George into a man who just doesn't get a lot of things but who has a great heart. Cathy Tyson brings a lot of assurance to her role. As the story progresses, she makes the character more and more complex. Michael Caine as Mortwell is something to see. He is calm, businesslike and without a single redeeming feature. He is not a man you'd want to cross. When he says, "Life goes on. We can't control it. We can only swim in it," you get a real sense that he sees life as nothing more than excrement .
This is a first class movie. The Criterion DVD transfer is very good. There's a commentary track featuring Jordan and Hoskins. |
| Rating | | | Date | March 17, 2005 | | Summary | No smile in this picture | Content
| Bob Hoskins plays an underworld figure who is forced by his mob boss (Michael Caine) to drive a beautiful call girl (Cathy Tyson) around on her appointments at night. He falls in love with her and tries to protect her, then feels angered and rejected when he finds she is in love with another woman. She ends up shooting Caine and Hoskins leaves her. Not a very pleasant picture to watch--it's very sordid and depraved. But the acting is first rate, and the story has some depth to it. Worth a watch. |
| Rating | | | Date | February 19, 2005 | | Summary | Great movie it would be nice to have more extras though | Content
| "Mona Lisa" remains one of Neil Jordan's best movies. Bob Hoskins plays George a small time thug who took went to prison to protect his boss Mortwell (Michael Caine). To reward George for his sacrifice he gives him a job chaffeuring around Simone (Cathy Tyson)a high priced call girl that Mortwell wants to keep track of. Despite her initial chilly reception, George falls in love with her. Ultimately she asks him to make a major sacrifice so she can be free of Mortwell and his world. It's a price that leads to tragedy and violence.
A brilliant film noir, Hoskins earned an Oscar nomination for his performance and really he deserved it. His portrayal of George is complex. While he's a criminal, he's also surprisingly naive and innocent in his own way and the code of conduct he follows in his life reflects much more solid values than that of a petty crook. Michael Caine shines in a pivotal but small role as Mortwell. Caine has never given a performance as nasty and chillingly evil as he does here. Cathy Tyson ("The Serpent and the Rainbow", "Priest") also deserves kudos for her performance as Simone. Although the surface of her character is chilly she hints at the depths of emotion raging beneath the surface of this sophisticated and sad woman.
The Criterion edition of this looks exceptionally good with nice color reproduction and a crisp, sharp picture. It appears that the same master that was used for the 1996 laserdisc was used here, though, and it probably should have been remastered from a new digital transfer. While presented in its original widescreen format this isn't an anamorphic transfer that I can tell which is, again, another reason to update this and create a high definition DVD.
Neil Jordan and Bob Hoskins commentary track provide a surprising amount of interesting detail about the making of the movie. Usually commentary tracks with an actor and director devolves into a lovefest with little actually uncovered but that's not the case here. We learn about the difficulty that Jordan had initially interesting backers in the project and how pivotal the casting of Michael Caine was to making this project viable.
I still would have liked to have more in the way of extras for this classic film. Like the recent re-release of "The Crying Game", there has to be some alternate scenes that survived or outtakes that might have been of interest to fans. Additionally, why not do a retrospective documentary or a glimpse back at Jordan's career as a featurette? Hopefully Criterion (or whomever picks up the license on this film for DVD release in the US) will remaster this and add the extras that this classic film calls for. |
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