Untamed Heart

Every so often the minds behind big-budget Hollywood get all nostalgic, we imagine, and reminisce about the Good Old Days when you could put a big soppy romance story on the screen and people would flock to see it. And then it hits them - let’s bring them old days back! Let’s make a movie romance for the modern age! And then they go pick a cutesy script and cast Meg Ryan in it, safe in the knowledge they’ll score a box office hit, or they’ll hire Richard Gere even if that means the resulting movie is about as emotionally involving as a dinner for two at Dave’s Hot Dog Bar & Grill. The story’s almost always the same: boy meets girl (or vice versa), they court, they fall in love, they fight, they break up, they pine, they reunite, the end.

Caroline (Marisa Tomei) realises there's something special about Adam (Christian Slater)

Untamed Heart is an exception to that rule. Like its genre counterparts, it throws away any attempt at cool points by being an essentially cheesy story about true love and the stuff that goes with it. But here there’s a slight difference. Boy meets girl (and vice versa), they meet and he says nothing. They court, and he still says nothing. He rescues her from danger, still saying nothing. They fall in love and he murmurs a little, and then… they stay in love. Strange, but true.

Made in 1993 at the height of its stars’ careers, Untamed Heart tells the story of unlucky-in-love waitress Caroline (Marisa Tomei), who has made a life-long habit of falling for men who promptly dump her. Late one night while walking home from work she is chased and attacked by two men, but is rescued just in time by Adam (Christian Slater), who works silently washing dishes at the same diner. Her gratitude soon turns to curiosity about her mysterious rescuer, and not long after that she realises that she’s becoming attracted to him. The two quickly fall for each other, and Caroline realises she’s finally found the relationship she’s searched for all her life. “He doesn’t make sense, I don’t make sense… together, we make sense,� she explains to workmate Cindy (Rosie Perez). But the reason for Adam’s reclusive nature is something that neither of them has any control over...

It’s a simple story, sure, one which requires the viewer to check their cynicism at the door. But that’s easy when you’ve got performances as good as these. Marisa Tomei did this film right after her Oscar-winning comedy turn in My Cousin Vinny. But here she shows just how powerful a dramatic actor she can be - it’s the best performance of her career to date, no question. Taking a straightforward character and bringing her to vibrant life every second she’s on the screen, she pulls the audience effortlessly into Caroline’s emotional world and allows them to actually feel her experiences. Christian Slater’s challenge is different, but no less well handled; to gain audience empathy with a man who doesn’t speak for the first few times we meet him is no small task, but he pulls it off perfectly. The chemistry between the two stars is undeniable, and it’s a hard heart indeed that doesn’t feel at least a small tug of emotion as events play out.

Director Tony Bill, who’s been doing more TV than cinema since, knows full well that his leads are the film’s great assets, and makes sure that he captures the little nuances and details that breathe life into the characters. Credit must also be given to the well-judged screenplay, written by Tom Sierchio with his heart firmly on his sleeve (Sierchio hasn’t done a movie since, but reportedly will make his directing debut this year with another original script). It’s rare that a romance-minded film is willing to spend most of its time simply letting its characters connect with each other, and ten years later that’s still refreshing to see.

Cynics should stay well clear, but this is a movie that rises above the usual “chick flick� or soap mentality by virtue of intelligent, heartfelt writing and two stunning, moving performances. Having not seen this one for some years, we weren’t sure it’d work as well today. But Untamed Heart stands the test of time well.

Oh, and one quick aside for trivia fans. The song used to open and close Untamed Heart and provide an emotional backdrop to the story is the undeniably classic Nature Boy, written by the marvellously un-showbiz Eden Ahbez back in the 1940s and popularised by Nat “King� Cole (whose version plays over the end credits here). The same song, albeit in a more extravagantly orchestrated form, was used to open and close Baz Lurhmann’s Moulin Rouge eight years later for a similar emotional effect. Coincidence or homage? You decide!

Offered in its original 1.85:1 theatrical aspect ratio, Untamed Heart makes its belated arrival on DVD with a reasonable enough transfer; reasonable enough, that is, for the mid-’90s when it was almost certainly done. This appears to be a PAL version of the same transfer that was used for the widescreen laserdisc back then, and the slight “gauze� over the image that’s a tell-tale element of many ’90s transfers is clearly visible here. The video is 16:9 enhanced here, but may very likely have been upscaled to that format for DVD. The image is fairly soft by today’s standards, and the contrast range is muted - whites are never truly white, and colours seem a little washed out. This was a very good transfer for its day, but technology’s moved on; if this one had come out through Columbia Tristar we would probably be watching a brand new hi-def transfer, but beggars can’t be choosers when it comes to a film which hardly set the box office on fire when it came out. This still looks way better on DVD than it has on any other video format to date.

Audio here is simply a straight copy of the matrixed surround track heard in cinemas - though MGM haven’t made use of the Dolby Surround flag during encoding, so be sure and hit that Pro-Logic button before you sit down to watch this one. Sound quality is typical of a non-digital film of this vintage - clean, crisp and noise-free, with good fidelity but maybe a little too much of a tendency to push the various bits of pop music on the soundtrack into the surrounds.

By the way, we get a full set of foreign-language dubs on this disc, and special mention must go to the German track, where the lip-synch is so well handled you’d swear Marisa Tomei was imported from Berlin to make the movie.

You want a writer/director commentary? Or perhaps one from a present-day Marisa Tomei or Christian Slater? Yep, so do we, but all that’s on offer here is a measly theatrical trailer, in 16:9 and in pretty good condition.

All that’s left is for us to offer our usual notes to MGM: namely, please stop disabling the DVD player controls during the interminable copyright notices after the movie so we have to eject the disc to escape. And please turn down that MGM DVD intro, it keeps scaring the crap out of the neighbours...!

Okay, it’s certainly not for everyone, particularly in the decidedly less touchy-feely world of cinema in 2003. But if you’re game for it, go watch Untamed Heart. It might just make you feel better about the world, even if it’s only for an hour and a half.