The Human Stain (2003)

I had always wanted to see this movie but it was only tonight that I finally did.

I thought it was very well written and impeccably acted.

The screenplay was written by Nicholas Meyer.

It's an adaptation of a novel by Philip Roth.

The central character is black, but was born able to "pass" for white in an age when there was (unfortunately) a great incentive to do so.

This scene really got me.



Just that single word, the accusation: "Murderer."

That's the whole movie right there.

The person he becomes, he becomes by murdering someone else who was meant to exist.

And of course he's also "murdering" his own mother by disowning her.

This is like Imitation of Life (my Mom's favorite movie) revisited.

The critics who lambasted it either had a problem with "miscasting" and "believability" with regard to Hopkins and/or Kidman.

Some critics cited a problem with the p.c. controversy at the beginning which jump-starts the whole chain of events. They felt that cheapened the movie.

I guess I could see the argument about the overall shape of the movie, that if you pull back too far things start to fall apart.

But I just focused on the individual scenes, and there were so many powerful, well-written ones that I found the movie satisfying overall.

To be honest, I think I avoided this movie at the time precisely because I felt it was silly to see Anthony Hopkins playing a black character. If I'm honest. Because I felt that was such a Hollywood thing to do and that they should have found an unknown actor who did look like a black man who could pass for white and help audiences past the "suspension of disbelief" better than Hopkins could.