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| The Human Stain [2004] | ![The Human Stain [2004]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/41GGW5BJRBL._SL160_.jpg)
 enlarge | Director: Robert Benton
Actors: Anthony Hopkins, Nicole Kidman, Ed Harris, Gary Sinise, Wentworth Miller
Studio: Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainm
Category: DVD
List Price: £14.99
Buy New: £3.98
You Save: £11.01 (73%)
New (6) from £3.92
Avg. Customer Rating:  11 reviews
Sales Rank: 15553
Format: Anamorphic, Pal
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: Suitable for 18 years and over
Running Time: 101 minutes
Number Of Items: 1
Discs: 1
Aspect Ratio: 1.78:1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.2
Dimensions (in): 7.1 x 5.4 x 0.6
EAN: 5017188812641
ASIN: B0001XLY9C
Release Date: May 1, 2007
Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours
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Amazon.co.uk Review
Given the formidable challenge of adapting Philip Roth's acclaimed novel to the screen, it's a wonder that The Human Stain retains so much of what makes Roth's novel a masterpiece. As adapted by Nicholas Meyer, Robert Benton's film is inevitably a different animal altogether, and it's wide open to charges of miscasting and thematic diffusion. But at its core, this delicate drama succeeds in exposing the sins that stain all of humanity, forcing men like former welterweight boxer and esteemed professor Coleman Silk (Anthony Hopkins) to forsake family and career to conceal his African American heritage. Light-skinned and passing as a Jewish professor of classics in a tony East Coast college, 71-year-old Silk sinks into scandal when an innocent remark is misinterpreted as a racist slur, and this--along with his affair with an illiterate 34-year-old janitor (Nicole Kidman), and friendship with a reclusive novelist (Gary Sinise)--forms the crux of Benton's multilayered inquiry into the oppressive aftershocks of guilt, shame, and mourning, and the effects of judgment (internal and external) on our ability to connect. Roth's novel was one thing, Benton's film is another. Despite differing degrees of success, both are worthy of praise. --Jeff Shannon
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| Customer Reviews: Read 6 more reviews...
 Captured me from beginning to end. March 3, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
Antony Hopkins and Nicole Kidman are just brilliant in their roles, in this movie that should be better known and regarded.
Historical racism is contrasted with what Hopkins' character refers to as 'The double dyed hyprocracy of political correctness'. Difficult decisions taken in youth cascade down the decades. I find it fascinating and thought-provoking.
I never like to give the plot away, this one unfolds believably with tragic consequences, that kept me on the edge of my seat. It's well worth checking out.
Interesting plot-driven character study March 8, 2007
6 out of 7 found this review helpful
Classics Professor Coleman Silk (Anthony Hopkins), exasperated that two students have yet to show up for his class points to their empty seats and ask rhetorically, "Do they exist or are they spooks?" He should have chosen his words more carefully because the two absent students are black and Silk is subsequently charged with using racial slurs by the college.
Yes, this could definitely happen, although one would expect it to be cleared up once there was an investigation. However, Coleman Silk gets more than a little uptight. Something has hit a nerve. He has enemies. He doesn't cooperate and in fact resigns in face of the charge. His wife drops dead, and at the age of 71 Coleman gets involved in a Viagra-hyped love affair with Faunia Farley (Nicole Kidman), a 34-year-old cleaning woman and high school dropout with a past.
Turns out that Coleman too has a past, and that past partially explains why he got so uptight about the racial slur charge. Seems that Coleman has "passed." Seems that he was "colored" and didn't want to be colored and so forsook his family and passed into the white world and never looked back.
This is from the novel by Philip Roth, who has written many splendid novels. The adaptation is by Nicholas Meyer who did most of the scripts for the Star Trek movies. Robert Benton's direction is professional and clear. Anthony Hopkins is very good as one would expect and Nicole Kidman as a hardtack brunette with worry lines on her face is vividly real as the bitter, but vulnerable Faunia Farley. Ed Harris plays her also bitter, spaced-out, estranged husband, a twisted Viet Vet with malevolence on his mind.
The story is told in a straight-forward way with flashbacks to Coleman's past where we see that he was a welterweight prize fighter for a while and had his heart broken because his very blonde bride-to-be just couldn't stomach the thought of marrying into a Negro family. Wentworth Miller plays young Coleman and definitely looks and acts the part. Anna Deavere Smith plays his mother with the kind of dignity you would expect from a woman who raised the son of Pullman porter to become a classics professor at a small New England private college. Gary Sinise as Coleman's neighbor, Nathan Zuckerman (and Philip Roth perennial), narrates the story from the novel he eventually writes.
All in all an interesting movie that recalls an age gone by while at the same time reminding us that the politically correct postmodern world is upon us.
See this for Nicole Kidman who is on her way to becoming one of the great stars of the cinema as yet again she shows that she cannot be typecast, and for Anthony Hopkins, one of the more accomplished actors of our time.
Peak performances January 7, 2007
7 out of 7 found this review helpful
This film grabs the viewer from the opening scene. Through a winter's bleak landscape, a car's easy progress along the dark road is enhanced by the sedate pace of the background music. Before the credits have stopped running, the car is rolling into the roadside stream, the occupants clearly lost. An oncoming vehicle has driven them off the road deliberately, then continues on. Why has such a murder occurred?
Coleman Sylk [Hopkins] a classics scholar, denies a student's charge of racism as "spectacularly false", yet resigns his college post in protest. He contacts Nathan Zuckerman [Sinise] to commission him to write the story of his life - the son of "the only Jewish saloon keeper in East Orange". Zuckerman, a writer suffering "block" is reluctant to undertake the task, but as he learns more about Sylk, he becomes fascinated by the man. The unfolding story is far more of "An American Tragedy" than Theodore Dreiser could have ever envisioned.
Sylk, whose real story is far more convoluted than that of the "son of a Jewish saloon keeper", is an angry man. His outbursts aren't violent - that aspect of his life is clearly under tight control. But the events of his youth are reflected in his dealings with others in his later life. To explain this, Sylk's early life [Wentworth Miller] is portrayed as a succession of deceptions, from his struggle to follow his own desires against his father's wishes, to that father's own role in life. Coleman wanted to be boxer - he was good in the ring. But he follows a different path to become a classical scholar. The "first Jew to teach classical literature in America" - according to narrator Zuckerman.
The source of Coleman's ire becomes clear when he tells Zuckerman about his first love. While in university, he meets a young woman and invites her home to dinner. The result is an act in a long-term tragedy. A tragedy that has yet to be played out both in the film and in real life. Convoluting Coleman's already bizarre existence is his unexpected encounter with Faunia Farley [Nicole Kidman]. In what is demonstrably her best role, Kidman is a woman beset by tragic circumstances. Their liaison, which should be completely out of character for both, proves stable and enduring. A cynical farm woman struggling for survival, she should have little to offer the classics scholar. But Coleman's own struggles provide a hidden bond. The two become lovers, mutually reinforcing and restoring a positive approach to their lives.
It's easy for Hopkins to impart tension in a film role - he's done it often enough. But here, he displays a new version of that emotion. There is the visible manifestation of self-control. While he can release his rage when he's relating his story to Zuckerman, a whole new aspect appears when he's with Kidman. In turn, while she might simply be grateful for his attention, Kidman becomes enamoured of his qualities. She discovers his strengths and capacities, leading her to develop a sincere affection for this stranger. Together, the endure challenges and overcome them. All but the last one.
There are many roles in this film deserving applause. Anna Deveare Smith's depiction of Coleman's mother, Ed Harris as Faunia's ex-husband and, of course, Jacinda Barrett as Coleman's university-days lover stand out well under Benton's direction. Hopkins and Kidman, however, rightly dominate this production. Kidman, in particular, exhibits a capacity hardly promised in her other roles. This film is reminiscent of two of Sean Connery's in which two co-stars, Lorraine Bracco and Catherine Zeta-Jones seem to suddenly blossom out of previous mediocrity. Was there an unforeseen magic between Hopkins and Kidman, or did Benton provide a catalyst needed to bring out the best these two could provide? However the formula worked, the product is something outstanding. [stephen a. haines - Ottawa, Canada]
hum... October 25, 2006
3 out of 5 found this review helpful
Pro's: Anthony Hopkins is credible; he is not hammy. Good point for Wentworth Miller, he's perfect: both A.Hopkins and W.Miller are charismatic in their common role. Ed Harris is touching in the role of the writer. Moving story, especially the scenes where young Coleman decides to deny his identity. Les (the character, I don't remember the actor's name) is highly sadistic; he looks like a dangerous lunatic.
Con's: Humm bad point for Kidman: her character is a caricature of the 'poor mother' type! Too bad they reduced the importance (in the film) of Iris, Coleman's wife. It's as if she was not important at all. Pb: we never really see Coleman being fired... He leaves the college out of the blue and... that's all. Steena Paulsson is like an innocent little girl; she has no charisma (how could Coleman fall in love with her??)
But: I liked the film and I intend to read the book! ;-)
I shall have to read the book now ... October 19, 2006
6 out of 6 found this review helpful
"The Human Stain" is the film version of a highly acclaimed book by Philip Roth. It is a moving and powerful, if rather sad story. I suspect that it wasn't possible in a normal length film to do justice to all the ideas in the original book, and having watched the film I will now have to read the book to find out.
The film begins with a car crash. Then it jumps back a few months, and you are told that Coleman Silk (Anthony Hopkins) is a distinguished Jewish classics professor, and Dean of a college which he has turned round at the price of making plenty of enemies.
It is five weeks into a new academic term, and Silk is giving a seminar. He notes that two students, who had missed all his previous lectures and seminars, are absent yet again, having failed to attend a single one of his lessons since arriving at the college. He asks if they are real, or "spooks." Never having laid eyes on the individuals concerned, he did not know that they are black. Spooks used to be a rude word for an african-american, so Coleman Silk finds himself accused of racism.
Silk explodes with anger, giving ammunition to the enemies who want an excuse to oppose him, while those he has helped do not dare stand up for him. The irony is that he could have stopped the allegation in its tracks with a truth which he cannot bring himself to share - for he has been living a lie for many years.
The title "The human stain" refers to the impact all of us have on the world around us.
The film is not particularly fast paced, but it is very powerful, and has some excellent acting, particularly from Hopkins as Coleman Silk in old age, Wentworth Miller who plays Silk as a young man, and Nicole Kidman as Faunia Farely, a penniless young woman who he becomes involved with. Other performances worthy of note include those of Anna Deavere Smith, and Ed Harris as Faunia's psychotic ex-husband.
Not a film to watch if you want a "lift" or cheering up. But a good one if your want some powerful and moving drama.
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