Hotel Sorrento. - movie reviews

National Review, June 26, 1995 by John Simon

Three sisters always fire somebody's imagination. In Russia, Chekhov's; in Austria, that of the author of the popular operetta Das Dreimaderlhaus; in England (and elsewhere) the various fictionalizers of the Bront -- sisters. In Australia, there was Hannie Rayson's play Hotel Sorrento, now a movie directed by Richard Franklin, co-adapted by him and Peter Fitzpatrick.

This time round we get the three Moynihan sisters. Hilary runs a coffee shop out of the Moynihan house overlooking Melbourne Bay, fondly referred to as Hotel Sorrento. Pippa is back on a visit from the States to investigate setting up a sandwich franchise along American fast-food lines. Meg has become a writer in London, married an Englishman, and written a novel short-listed for the Booker prize. A thinly veiled autobiography, it doesn't make the other family members happy. These include Wal Moynihan, the widowed and autocratic patriarch who, with his grandson Troy, Hilary's child, goes for a daily swim in the Bay. Troy, 16, comes of age when, on such a swim, disaster strikes. Meg, too, returns to the sweet, red-roofed family house with Edwin, her very British husband. Also occasionally around are Marge Morrissey, an elderly lady who is a weekend Bayside resident and avid reader of Meg's novel, eager to explore its basis in fact. And with her is Dick Bennett, an independent newspaper editor and columnist, keen on interviewing Meg. One of the key scenes is a lunch party at which Dick lights into Meg and her novel as examples of the betrayal of Australia and Australian values; of course, Pippa and her Americanization are also implicitly under fire. The debate becomes fierce. Yet Hilary's sedentariness is seen as a provincialism equally questionable. And then there is an old family drama that comes out in the wash. If this sounds a bit like soap opera with political overtones, so it almost is. But that almost makes an important difference, setting Hotel Sorrento apart from and above that justly despised genre. Such issues as leaving home versus staying, American and English values versus homey Australian ones, writing tell-all books that may hurt your relatives' feelings even if they become artistic successes, exogamic marriage between an Aussie and a Brit, responsibility for a possibly avoidable fatal accident, the takes of outsiders on a family (Marge romanticizes it, Dick is critical of it), and, above all, the internecine rivalries and recriminations among the sisters are all treated with cogency and a solid dramatic sense. In fact, there is only one scene that misfires: precisely that crucial luncheon debate, which has an awkwardly stagey feel and look. Otherwise, the movie works, and does not exhibit that stiltedness often adhering to adaptations of stage works. For this, thank Richard Franklin, who has directed (as well as adapted) with a nice feeling for both the picturesque land- and sea-scapes and the stormily riven soul-scapes. Geof Burton, a fine Australian cinematographer, does everything possible to evoke the genius loci. And there is quietly intense acting from everyone, notably the sisters, played by Caroline Goodall (Meg), Tara Morice (Pippa), and Caroline Gillmer (Hilary), who could, however, shed thirty pounds with impunity. And as Marge, there is the incomparable Joan Plowright, whose sly expressions and magisterial elocution double-bottomed with irony make everything she touches at least doubly alive.