Spotlight
Spotlight Date: 18-May-03
Spoiler Rating: Medium
A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries (1998)
One makes a movie out of a book, I suppose, because he thinks a story or character is riveting, or because he wants to build or improve upon it, or because he seeks to capture visually the feel of it --- the book's particular time, place, or emotional atmosphere. This latter aim has to be the most difficult to accomplish, but that is apparently what the filmmakers were after in adapting Kaylie Jones' work "A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries" for the big screen.
The filmmakers in this instance are the producer/director team of Ismail Merchant and James Ivory, who are most noted (along with screenwriter Ruth Prawer Jhabvala) for their adaptations of E. M. Forster novels ("A Room With a View," "Howards End") and other "period" pieces. In "A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries," Ivory pays the same loving attention to the texture of his French and American settings in the 1960s and 1970s as he did to turn-of-the-century England. What he creates is a tasteful, modest film that doesn't contain a lot of action or drama or moralizing, but satisfies as a tale about the evolution of a family and the importance of being loved.
"A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries" is divided into three segments, each named for a male character who plays an important part in the young life of Channe Willis, the "daughter" of the title. The first segment, "Billy," takes place during the 1960s in Paris, where Channe's parents (Kris Kristofferson and Barbara Hershey) enjoy a gay expatriate life funded by his successful career as a writer. Seven-year-old Channe (Luisa Conlon, marvelous) is the smart, precocious apple of their eye, but she is forced to share her happiness when they adopt a French boy her own age, who soon opts to be called Billy. After an awkward start, however, Channe learns that her brother has brought about more love in her home instead of less, and they become close friends. Billy's childhood sweetness is emphasized in contrast to a nasty little fiend that Channe meets at the end of the first section, in a scene that introduces the notion of her incipient sexuality.
This theme is further explored in the second segment, named for Francis (Anthony Roth Costanzo), Channe's best friend at school. Now in her early teens (and played by Leelee Sobieski), Channe is an impressionable, energetic girl struggling with wanting to belong to other people while still forging a distinct personality. This struggle is fully embodied in her relationship with Francis, an eccentric, soon-to-be-homosexual outcast with an overbearing bohemian mother, who adores Channe as a soulmate but is forced to accept that he cannot keep her all to himself. In fact, he loses her completely as the second segment gives way to the third, "Daddy," in which the Willis family moves from Paris to a gorgeous home in New England. As her parents cope with her father's increasingly poor health, Channe takes to exploring the ups and downs of teen sex, while Billy (Jesse Bradford) tries to adjust to his new surroundings. In the end, though much is lost and much remains uncertain, the family continues its steady march into the future with the security of knowing that they are bound to each other by indissoluble ties.
Just who is the star of "A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries" is a debatable and probably irrelevant question. Channe has the most screen time, but the beginning and end of the movie concern Billy; or rather, the beginning concerns the young woman who gave him up for adoption (a recurring story throughout the film), and the end addresses the question of whether Billy has found the life his mother wished he would, in which he is loved "as is his right." (It's also arguable that the real star of the story is Mr. Willis, who is almost a superfather: wise, frank, kind, patient, and non-judgmental, and the glue that holds the family together.) But although the narrative suffers a bit from lacking a main focus, the overall feeling of "A Soldier's Daughter Never Cries" relies upon it. The star, in effect, is the family as a whole, as a living, growing organism made up of distinct parts. Channe's and Billy's upbringing is unconventional and not without trauma, but it is distinguished by the love and mutual respect between every member of their family. The secondary stories involving not only Billy's birth mother but also Francis and the family's Parisian housemaid serve to highlight the fact that the love the Willis family shares is both uncommon and incredibly important as a foundation for a happy, fulfilling life. Consequently, instead of the memory of a particular character or series of events, the film leaves the viewer with a lingering sensation of the beauty of long-term, nurturing affection.
Copyright © 2003 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.
