"I Dreamed of Africa" is one of my all-time favorite books, so I winced when I heard that it was being adapted for a movie. Of course, that didn't stop me from seeing the movie during its opening weekend.
A brief synopsis of plot: an Italian woman, her second husband and young child move to a large ranch in Kenya, where they confront hardship, tragedy, and great beauty.
Because I love the book so much, I had a number of problems with the movie. First, the casting of Kim Basinger as Kuki Gallmann. Sure, Basinger is beautiful to look at on screen (God, I can't believe she's over 45! She's gorgeous!) but she never captured the Kuki Gallmann I know from the book. Plus, it was jarring to hear Basinger's American accent. I've read that Basinger was set to give Meryl Streep a run for her money: well, knowing something about Streep's preparation for roles, she would have perfected an Italian accent had she been cast in this movie. "I Dreamed of Africa," I believe, was written in English by the multi-lingual Gallmann, and perhaps the "voice" of the movie would have been more believable with this touch. (One jarring scene for me was when Basinger was picking up her young son from school in what looked like to be Venice ... she's speaking English, but she tosses out a Ciao! to a passerby. It just struck me as weird.)
The other thing that bugged me about Basinger was all of weird facial expressions. In many scenes, she looked like she was upset or about to blow, but then she did nothing. The only scene she captured was near the end, when she was tending to her son Emanuele as he lay dying.
Indeed, Kuki and Paolo (her husband) come across looking like a couple of obnoxious expats in this movie -- hunting, partying with other Europeans, and using the Africans to tend to their vast estate. They came across as totally unsympathetic, especially Paolo, who acts like a spoiled, rich playboy. In the book, they're both much more likeable.
The movie itself was choppy, moving from scene to scene mechanically. I was also sorry to see that the director didn't choose to explore the African characters more thoroughly, as Gallmann does in her book.
If you read and loved "I Dreamed of Africa" then go see the movie: I think you'll enjoy the cinematography and views of Gallmann's ranch. If you haven't read it, then avoid the movie, head over to Amazon.com, and spend the time you'd be in the movie reading it.
Academy Award -winner Kim Basinger stars in this epic tale of a woman s quest for adventure and a new life in the majestic, untamed lands of rural Afr...More at Buy.com Marketplaces
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