The Hours, based on the Man Booker Prize winner by Michael Cunningham - 10 out of 10

The Hours, based on the Man Booker Prize winner by Michael Cunningham 
10 out of 10


Just as the original material is one of the best books in recent years, the film The Hours is one of the best motion pictures of the past decades.

It was nominated for a series of Oscars, including the most relevant ones for Best Film, Director, Writing, Supporting Actor and Actress and it won the Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for Nicole Kidman.
The Hours took the Golden Globe for the same artist and for Best Drama, BAFTAs and many other prizes.

There are three separate and yet intertwined stories, of Virginia Woolf aka Nicole Kidman, Laura Brown aka Julianne Moore and Clarissa Vaughan aka Meryl Streep.

Virginia Woolf is struggling with her depression - I have recently read Any Human Heart, by the fabulous William Boyd, and in this extraordinary novel, Mrs. Woolf is depicted as a racist, rather obnoxious, negative, unlikeable creature.
The writer receives the visit of her sister, Vanessa Bell aka Miranda Richardson, and her noisy children, that find a fallen bird that would soon expire and will be buried with a flower, in the garden.

Virginia Woolf seems to have a permanent conflict with her servant, that does not like the idea of traveling to London, to get what her master wants for the visit of the sister and her children.
Absent during the talk, the author decides not to kill the main character of her novel, Mrs. Dalloway.

Nevertheless, Laura Brown, a woman who lives in America, in the fifties, is determined to commit suicide, inspired to some extent by the reading of Mrs. Dalloway and the inadequacies of her life, the marriage to a man who seems so alien to her, Dan Brown aka John C. Reilly.
Mrs. Brown is visited by her neighbor, Kitty aka Tony Collette, who may have a tumor in her womb and wants so much to live and have children, while the depressed Laura is about to kill herself, maybe.

The two woman kiss in an outre moment, then Laura Brown takes a room in a hotel, where she has taken her pills and maybe these will be her final Hours.

The third story takes place recently, in New York, where Clarissa Vaughan aka Meryl Streep is organizing a party for her friend, Richard Brown aka Ed Harris, who has won the most important poetry prize.
Alas, he is dying of AIDS, sardonically, he claims this is the reason they declared him the winner, and he is unstable, suffers from memory loss, changes of moods and depression, to name just a few afflictions.

Clarissa is a lesbian living with Sally Lester aka Allison Janney - I happened to see a show where this excellent artist talked about the making of The Hours and how Cardinal the work with Meryl Streep has been.
Meryl Streep has told Allison Janney that she has some advice and in the scene in which they kiss, she pulled the skin from the face of her partner, with a very good effect.

The Hours is not just formidable, it is outstanding, glorious, phenomenal and a pleasure to watch again...
It was scheduled on one of the many film channels we have now - Alhamdulillah! - and it is probably the third time that I have enjoyed this Masterpiece.