Midnight in the Garden
is Evil... Just E-e-e-e-vil!

If you read last week's review of The Rainmaker you have a good idea what direction this review will take. Yes, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil is based on a book by the same name. Yes, I read the book (and loved it) before I saw the movie. Yes, the book is better. Much better.

For those of you unfamiliar with the story, Midnight is a fictionalized account of the events surrounding a murder trial in Savannah, Georgia, in the early '80s. John Berendt's book weaves stories of interesting Savannah characters with the trial of Jim Williams, a antique dealer accused of shooting a young man who worked for him.

More interesting than the trial are Berendt's observations of the people around him. The ensemble cast includes a drag queen, a pair of house squatters, a voodoo priestess, a inventor who threatened to poison the city, and -- of course -- a suspect in a murder trial. The trial was made more interesting when it was uncovered that the boy Williams shot was not only his employee but also his lover.

Sadly, the movie completely rips the soul out of the book. Savannah is little more than window dressing for the story which focuses too much on the trial and oversimplifies the characters into caricatures of themselves. Director Clint Eastwood fails to capture the spirit of the people and the majesty of the historic antebellum homes. Even fans of the book will have trouble identifying the major points of interest on the screen, despite the fact that Clint and company shot on location in the south Georgia city.

I give the movie three points because it included a marvelous performance by Kevin Spacey as Williams, a good performance by John Cusack as the reporter character (named John Kelso in the film), and for the entertaining (albeit too brief) appearance by the real Emma Kelly as herself. Fans of the book will remember her as the "Lady of 8,000 Songs."

I cannot recommend this movie to anyone who has not read the book because there is little of interest in the plot. The dialog, when not taken from the book, is stilted. The trial drags on incessantly and takes time away from the more interesting characters in the film. Also, the amount of screen time given to The Lady Chablis (played by the real Chablis, a drag queen) is disproportional to the book. In fact, screenwriter John Lee Hancock does a injustice by making her integral to the trial (something with which she has no connection in the book).

To my mind, the grossest misdeed in the script deals with the character of Mandy, played (not coincidentally) by Clint's daughter, Alison Eastwood. In an apparent effort to give Alison more screen time, her minor character was changed to become Kelso's love interest. This revisionist history is misleading and makes two horrible mistakes. First, it more or less writes out the character of Joe Odum (played by Paul Hipp), one of the funniest characters in the book. Second, it seems horribly out of place and acts only as a catalyst for a Hollywood "happy" ending.

I'm not unreasonable. I realize that a 400 page novel must be altered when written as a movie (even one which exceeds two and a half hours in length). What I cannot abide is a revisionist approach to history which completely destroys the sanctity of the written work. This movie would have been better served if Hancock had stuck more closely to the book and avoided the crass exaggerations of the characters. While someone who has not read the book will not see a difference, I found it reprehensible.

You may be wondering where the title of the book (and movie) comes from. The voodoo priestess Minerva (played by Irma P. Hall) explains that in her trade the half hour before midnight is for doing good and the half hour after is for doing evil. If that is the case, then Clint and the crew of Midnight must have done all their work just past the stroke of twelve.

MY RATING: 3 out of 10.

RATED: R
RUN TIME: 154 min.