User Reviews

I think this film is another fine example of Kiwi talent! Some incredibly original literature, film, television, and acting talent originates from the island nation of New Zealand. "An Angel At My Table" is one of the great examples. The first time I saw this film (or tele-film) I was left emotionally affected by Janet Frame's life. I could not believe how easy it was for someone to be treated the way she was just because she was shy, socially awkward and had curly, red hair. How times have changed! Nowadays if you are not a freak ... you are a freak! It is scary to think how easy it was, apparently at that time, for a person to be thrown into a madhouse. Not to mention the deplorable conditions of those types of institutions.

Initially, I felt sorry for Ms. Frame but then I realized she probably has had a fuller life than I have had (or probably ever will). She has accomplished so much and given pleasure to the many who have read her stories and poetry. Watching this film has prompted me to begin looking for her writings since I have been so intrigued by her story. I was glad to see that by the end of the movie she had begun to become comfortable with herself and open her shell. Biographical information on Ms. Frame seems sketchy. I have not found much information about her life after the period where the film ended.

Thank you Jane Campion for another wonderful character driven film (albeit a real-life character this time)! The only real criticism I have of the film is the portrayal of Frame's time in the institution. While the film did not make it pretty nor gloss over the situation in general, sources I have read indicate Janet was dangerously close to receiving an operation that seems similar to a lobotomy. The operation, if performed, would have left Janet an emotionless, child-like creature and was not adequately depicted. But for the grace of her publication, she was saved.

What do these people have in common: Lou Reed, Vivien Leigh, Yves Saint Laurent, and Janet Frame? Answer: They were all given electroconvulsive shock therapy for highly questionable reasons, and suffered because of it.

Going in to this film I'd never read anything by New Zealand author Janet Frame, but nevertheless found the story of her life to be interesting. She's a compelling figure because of how awkward she was, clearly intelligent and talented but also riddled with social anxiety. It's very well cast, with the transitions between three actresses at differing portions of her life from child to adult being seamless, and all giving good performances.

I didn't give the film a higher rating because despite coming in at 238 minutes spread out over three parts, it left me with questions about aspects of her life and somehow lacked detail in places it shouldn't have, and was probably too long in others. Transitions were often on the abrupt side, and there seemed to be a certain softening of things. Maybe that's how life is when told with a backward glance over decades though, I don't know. Anyway, it's a pretty good film, and one with an uplifting spirit to it.

It's a biography of New Zealand author Janet Frame played by three different actresses over her life. She was born in 1924. Her large family is relatively poor. She's a chubby sensitive kid with big wild red hair. As a young teacher (Kerry Fox), she has an emotional breakdown and spends time in a mental hospital. She is diagnosed a schizophrenic. With her mother's approval, she is admitted to a mental hospital for over 8 years where she is subjected to 200 shock treatments barely escaping brain surgery.

This is an interesting portrait of a life. It isn't that dramatic except for the hospital section. It's more a series of events where a nervous Janet is belittled and overlooked. It doesn't fit the traditional three act play structure. It's a simple straight time line of events. Jane Campion uses her style of directing. It's natural and confident. A more standard biopic would concentrate on the 8 year hospital stay making a drama out of it. Instead, this way is a more humanistic way of showing a life. Kerry Fox is terrific and the little girl has an unforgettable look.

I discovered this incredible film by accident, if there are such things as accidents like this...I saw the title in a movie review book (and a very brief summary) and it intrigued me. Because I knew it was a New Zealand import from years ago, I never even bothered trying to locate a copy. So when it called out to me months later from the shelves in the video shop, I felt eerily compelled to rent it. I watched it by myself in the wee hours of the morning--and it could not have been more ideal.

An Angel at My Table is the story of New Zealand's famous writer, Janet Frame. Fairly long, but never boring, it is told in three 50 minute interludes, taking us through her impoverished childhood, awkward adolescence, and the terrifying and eventually triumphant years that follow: Janet was a plump little girl, with an unruly mop of bright red hair. She was fascinated with books and stories at an early age ~ a friend had lent her a copy of Grimm's which she treasured. A certificate of merit in grade school allowed her the use of the public library where she became even more immersed in literature. Despite financial hardships, her father managed to buy her a journal "for her writings." By her late teens she was no longer plump, but a rather crippling shyness had set in. At social functions she played the wallflower. She preferred to be by herself, where she could nurture her passion for creating stories. She went on to become a teacher (though the idea no longer appealed to her), and suffered a panic attack when a supervisor "sat in" on one of her classes. It was advised that Janet have a psychiatric evaluation--a misdiagnosis of schizophrenia (later changed to nothing more than shyness and depression) landed her in a mental institution for eight years of electric shock therapy, each session she narrated to be: "equal in fear to that of an execution." She was scheduled for a partial lobotomy when news reached her doctors that she had won a national literary award--during her hospitalization her sister had published a book of Janet's short stories. She was almost immediately released under the premise that a talented author couldn't possibly need the treatment she had been receiving....At this point Janet was in her late twenties, but her lengthy "exile" had given the impression that she was considerably younger than that. A friend of the family's, another writer who admired her work, offered her a cottage on his property so that she could write seriously in a distraction-free environment. She accepted the offer and her first completed work there was accepted soon after. European travels were arranged for her, more successful books were born, and fame attained...

I've heard it claimed that Janet had also attained happiness, but I am not sure that I agree. Janet had found numerous freedoms, emotional and financial and of course physical, but happiness? I believe that she had become comfortable with herself, and perhaps that in itself is a happiness. She never did fit into the surrounding world--but lived peacefully alone on the vaporous outskirts. A very supportive therapist in London had told her, "If people tell you that you should go out there and mix, and you don't feel like it,...don't." She took his words to heart.

I was surprised with the overall beauty of this film~I guess I should not have been~the director was Jane Campion (The Piano, Portrait of a Lady). The New Zealand landscapes and backstreets of Spain were gorgeously rendered, the accompanying score at times both capricious and melancholy. But above all, what struck me most, was how I identified with Janet. The plump and impoverished childhood, the obsession with writing, the painful shyness and reclusiveness. The life of the outsider~luckily minus the stay in the psychiatric ward. On some level I was Janet (or am Janet). And there is something oddly redemptive in finding a twin on screen or in a book, however juvenile the notion...

"An Angel at My Table" (1990) made by Jane Campion is a true life-story of Janet Frame (1924-2004), New Zealand's most famous author. The film starts with young Jane, a funny -looking red haired girl, shy and quiet who knew too well that she was "poor, smelly, and unpopular". Then it follows her to misdiagnosis of schizophrenia and more than 200 electroshock treatments in a mental hospital where she had spent eight years and a severe, lifelong shyness that was her only problem. Even in the hospital she was writing and was able to have her book published - writing did save her from losing her mind. The film is based on three of her memoirs, "To the Is-land", "An Angel at My Table" and "The Envoy from Mirror City".

Jane Campion made a very affecting and quietly powerful portrait of a writer who also was a gentle and genuinely humble woman. The film is never a sentimental manipulating story of a talented but misunderstood artist. It does not idealize Frame but it is a very honest and sympathetic portrait of an artist.

An Angel at My Table tells the story of famed New Zealand author Janet Frame. We are drawn into the quiet world of the shy, red-haired girl who struggles with her life, but succeeds through her exceptional talent of writing. Since her autobiography was written in three separate volumes, we are treated to a film in three separate parts, beginning with her journey through childhood. The film does an excellent job at portraying the character of Frame, and her nervous attitude when brought into social situations. Every ounce of shyness is felt off-screen, which is a kudos to the direction of Campion, that plays an important part in making sure that this woman is brought to life, as realistic, and as close to the truth as possible.

Growing up in poverty, with two hard-working parents, and 4 siblings, life must've been hard. But when you're thrust into such a difficult situation, it somehow seems normal and it doesn't bother that it's a much harder life than other people currently living are. But Janet lived through her childhood, finding that she would love to spend her life as a poet, or just writing. A depression hit her hard during her teenage years when an unexpected tragedy occurred, and she had chosen to write, instead of being with that person beforehand. Not knowing she was a depressed young person, Frame was sent to a mental hospital, and forced to undergo several shock treatments, under the incorrect diagnosis of schizophrenia. However, Frame persevered through it, using writing as a way of expressing her own thoughts. While still in the mental hospital, she was able to publish a book. The years inside the hospital are the most unpleasant of film, and Campion perfectly captures the deranged conditions that Janet experienced. The most remarkable part about the direction is how it doesn't go over the top to deliver a nauseating film in those scenes. Rather, she plays to the quiet personality of Frame. The film is kept with the same pace, and focused in a way that never wants to show itself off, but keeps the main character always in the center, without losing that focus.

The blown-up biopic `Malcolm X' was released around a year later, and while I admire that film, it was also very hyped-up before it's release. I found a strange drawing power in the fact that Jane Campion's film wasn't about spectacle, but about someone's life that is done more sincerely, and realistically, paying close attention to details, both period and human. Something you wouldn't find in a Hollywood biopic, such as Milos Foreman's `Man on the Moon,' which I openly despise.

The writer and director surprised me a bit concerning a small detail in the film. In films concerning `writing', and an exceptional author (Wonder Boys, Finding Forrester), there is never any real proof of how good the writer supposedly is. We are never allowed to read the great book they wrote, nor are there much of any excerpts written to prove to us that the writer is indeed as great as it is suggested. In films, I realize that it really isn't possible to show such a thing, since film is a visual medium instead of a literary one. Campion and the screenwriter know this, and without subjecting us to Frame's writing, she adds in some narration, using actress Kerry Fox's voice. The narration is spread out in small bits throughout the film, never taking control of telling the story. Instead, it conveys the thoughts going on in Frame's mind, which are all little excerpts from the writing contained in her autobiographies. It begins with narration and ends with it. A surprising detail that is small, but adds much to the overall film, and gives the ending a sweet, and optimistic touch to an amazing film.

Frame was (is) talented at what she did most of the time, without knowing the talent was there. She only knew that she loved to do it, and wanted to continue doing it for the rest of her life. That is true talent. She had it, even at times when she thought there wasn't any hope; she had the ability to write. And because of that ability, that talent, she was able to gradually come to terms, and live comfortably with her life. ****1/2 of five or (9/10)

In the ambitious follow-up to her celebrated debut feature 'Sweetie' Jane Campion presents yet another social misfit at odds with an unsympathetic world, drawing her inspiration this time from the autobiography of Janet Frame, a New Zealand writer who suffered eight years of electro-shock therapy after being misdiagnosed for schizophrenia. The film is structured in the form of a triptych, with the best moments (perhaps not surprisingly) all clustered in the first episode, showing the young Frame's childhood in a poor but literate household, always at the mercy of adult authority: teachers, doctors, and so forth. These early scenes aren't exactly meant to set a cheerful mood, but they look positively giddy compared to the rest of the film, the length of which eventually overwhelms its subject: watching the drab and lonely life of a painfully shy, pathetically insecure, repressed and introverted writer unfold over 158 minutes can be an oppressive experience. Campion's unique visual style is never less than interesting, but her technique of using sudden blackouts to separate short, seemingly unrelated fragments of narrative memory only underscores the difficulty of capturing on film the creative process of a writer.

Campion's work throughout the years has been inspirational, dark, moving, and powerful. Her ability to bring characters alive through words, actions, and emotions cannot be matched by many directors in Hollywood today. For this critic, her work is reminiscent of a female Lars von Trier, in which her ability to bring these larger than life characters out of their shell transforms them into darkened characters which evoke inspiring (yet saddening) events. As I watched "An Angel at my Table", I was reminded of Bess' journey with her husband, and consequentially her life, in Trier's "Breaking the Waves". Campion, without a doubt, is a director that stands on her own two feet and this film is pure example of that. To begin, Campion's direction is flawless. This is nearly a three-hour long biography of Janet Frame's life from young girl to the author she became. For some directors this may create an opportunity to enhance other characters, to trivialize smaller events so that we can do bigger things, or to just push along, very slowly, until we all nod off from boredom. Believe me; I have sat through my fare share of stunningly dull biopics. Campion proves she is better by breaking the film into three segments (three parts of Frame's autobiography), giving us amazing imagery coupled with a brisk pace that doesn't loose any of its translation or excitement. Her use of colors, the boldness of Frame's red hair, the powerful background of New Zealand (and eventually Europe) challenges us to pay closer attention, giving us not just a story worthy of our minds, but also our eyes and heart. The colors also provide a vivid counterpoint to the harsh realities of what Frame faces, her fears and her erroneous placement into hospital.

I thought this film was flawless, thus I can continue to babble on about how much I enjoyed Campion's film technique and style. She allowed us to make our own decisions on Frame, but also filmed in a style that never cramped our viewing space. We were never forced to just focus on Frame, but we did because Kerry Fox gave us this pure, uncut portrayal of Janet Frame. Due to this originally being filmed for New Zealand television, I can only assume it eliminated Fox from being nominated for an Academy Award, but she 100%, who heartedly, hands-down deserved it. Her performance, from someone I had never seen before, was phenomenal. She literally transformed herself into this character, every step that Fox took on screen she was taking it in the way that (we can only assume) Frame would do it as well. What I am trying to say is that while I never saw Janet Frame herself, Fox never went out of the character we were first introduced to. Fox's Frame grew with each frame, exposing herself differently to us and giving us a new side of her each time. Again, I am drooling on myself, but "An Angel at my Table" is one of those films that should be watched by film students eager to learn how to get into the mind of their characters. This would prove to them that there is more than just what is written on the page, and fully demonstrating how to bring a soul into a man-made story. Kerry Fox was everything you wanted to see on screen, she was emotional, sensitive, caring, unquestionably curious, scared, and yet completely and utterly human. Coupled with Campion's direction, the two take what could have been a bland film and transformed it into one of the greatest performances over the past 20 years.

For what other reasons should you watch this film? If you aren't as impressed with the direction or Fox's performance, Criterion packs the DVD with plenty of bonus features, but as well as an amazing transfer. The sound, the music of Frame's life, is breathtaking. It accompanies the vision and Fox's actions perfectly. The song sung by the sisters on the beach of New Zealand still remains with me today, nearly four days after my viewing of this film. The other actors are very good in this film, alas; I cannot say anything further because my focus was entirely captured on Kerry Fox. Yes, she was that amazing. The bonus features on this disc, as mentioned before, are great to learn more about how Campion directed this film as well as her thoughts via an audio commentary. In essence, the Criterion release of this film is the only way to watch this. It is a flawless disc for a flawless film. I am excited and proud to have this within my catalogue of films.

Overall, in case you haven't been paying attention this entire time, "An Angel at my Table" was nothing short of perfection. When I raise this film up to other biography based films, there isn't one that compares. Campion's work continues to impress as she grows, developing her strengths in other genres, and pushing actors to new limits beyond what we expect, i.e. though battered by critics, see Meg Ryan's performance in "In the Cut". "An Angel at my Table" has a perfect blend of score, outstanding visuals, enthralling storytelling, and again, this powerful ability to control her actors and expect nothing less than their best. Kerry Fox should be studied by students in this film, Campion's direction glides this actor from scene to scene, but Fox carries it all on her shoulders, with pride and with power. This was not an easy film to create, but with Campion and Fox behind the helm what could have been a very dull, overly dramatic biography on the great Janet Frame, transformed into this staple of modern cinema, a map (so to speak) for others who wish to create films based on real people – "An Angel at my Table" would lead you straight to the gold. Watch it. Be impressed. Than watch it again. Rinse, wash, repeat.

Grade: ***** out of *****

For some people, "An Angel At My Table' would be a VERY long sit-through. The story of one of New Zealand's most famous authors, who succeeds despite having gone through schizophrenia isn't exactly family entertainment. But although the movie runs far too long, at 2 and a half hours, I found myself engaged quite a bit as soon as the story got moving, and not a relentless character study. Janette Frame, a girl with a serious shock of red hair, grows up, realizing her passion for writing, and suffers tremendous setbacks, both emotionally and professionally. What a performance the three actresses give as Janette, we see Janette as a young girl, a teenager, and as a young adult. Although Kerry Fox is the most well known of all three, all three are tremendous here, each taking the nuances of Frame, and developing the character beautifully. As per the case of all Jane Campion's films, she knows how to frame the camera quite well, and again, although the movie IS long, it does have a lot of amazing little moments

This is an excellent mini-series that I couldn't stop watching. Based on the true-life story of writer Janet Frame, it provides an insight into a mental health system that further hampered, rather than improved its patients, and shows how one woman managed to get passed this, to become the respected woman New Zealanders now know her as.

Jane Campion's second feature film is a biography of New Zealand writer Janet Frame (1924-2004), drawn from her three sets of memoirs. Miss Frame was born in a large, turbulent family, got herself a bit of an education and spent eight years in and out of mental institutions. During this time, according to the movie, writing became therapy to her, and out of this arose works that were received as brilliant; she was scheduled to be lobotomized on the day she won her first literary award. The surgery never took place.

Kerry Fox plays Miss Rule as an adult, and the svelte actress gained almost thirty pounds for the role and wore an ugly, frizzy copper-red wig for the role -- very different from the Hollywood image of great women writers. Campion has always found fascination in ordinary-looking people.

If there is any point in this movie, other than the surface one of struggle and compassion for the unhappy and mentally unbalanced, it is the thin wedge between genius and madness. As far as I can tell, the only way to reliably tell the difference is to look at the result. If the product works, the creator is a genius, and if it fails, a madwoman.

My Rating : 7/10

The film follows Janet Frame from when she grows up in a poor family in New Zealand's South Island, through her years in a mental institution, and into her writing years after her escape.

Jane Campion does justice to Janet Frame's legacy and her casting and direction is precise. The story is told calmly and draws you in to the world and mind of Janet.

In 1920s and 1930s New Zealand, Janet Frame grows up in a poor family with lots of brothers and sisters. Already at an early age she is different from the other kids. She gets an education as a teacher but since she is considered abnormal she stays at a mental institution for eight years.

"An Angel at My Table" was the first film from New Zealand to be screened at the Venice Film Festival, where it received multiple standing ovations and was awarded the Grand Special Jury Prize despite evoking yells of protest that it did not win The Golden Lion. I respect that this was the film that really got New Zealand on the film map, but beyond that...

At no point did I care for the heroine. I feel like they exaggerated the main character's hair and appearance to the point where it was humorous and just not believable. I don't know Janet Frame, but nothing about this film made me want to go out and read her books.

"An Angel at My Table" (New Zealand, 1990): It's been three years since I've last watched this film. There is NO further reason to wonder if it should be in my "top" category. It is created by Jane Campion from the writer Janet Frame's autobiographies of her harrowing life. We join Janet during childhood, move through the teenage years and into adulthood, as she struggles for a place - ANY place - in the world...but deep down, writing is her one reliable love. Three actresses were needed for the role of Janet, and all do wonderful jobs, especially depicting someone who always feels on the outside, and longs to be included. Jane Campion, one of my favorite film makers, presents a powerful, subdued, and melancholy work of Art. It is not an amazing film due to every camera shot or the quality of sound recording… THIS work is great for its acting, and its story telling. It has as much emotion as one heart can hold for 157 minutes.

It's a biopic about Janet Frame (1924-2004), a literary star from New Zealand. It's based on Frame's three-volume autobiography and was originally aired as a three-part television series in New Zealand. The film covers her life for the years from about 1930 to the early 1960s.

Janet Frame (Alexia Keogh as a child, Karen Fergusson as a teenager, Kerry Fox as a young adult and adult) grows up in rural New Zealand as a middle child in an impoverished family. She is always "different." As a child, she is pudgy with uncontrollable red hair. She is very shy when away from her family but is loved within her family. Her father (Kevin J. Wilson) is sometimes a brute, especially with her older brother, who is an undiagnosed epileptic, but one senses Janet is a special favorite of his. The whole family loves reading, which nurtures her early literary efforts at writing poetry and such. However, she is very naive and blandly reports at the supper table one night that Myrtle (Melina Bemecker), her older sister, was f-----g the neighbor boy. Several years later, Myrtle dies in a drowning accident.

When Janet goes to college, her shyness becomes more intense, and she socializes with no one, even when joined by her sister, Isabel (Glynis Angell). Isabel also drowns accidentally. Janet takes a teaching position but again isolates herself and flees when a school inspector visits the class.

She begins eight years in and out of mental hospitals where she is badly diagnosed as schizophrenic and undergoes up to 200 electrical shock treatments. Somehow she writes a collection of short stories during this time that is published to great acclaim. This success saves her from a proposed lobotomy. Her literary success generates a grant to travel to Europe, where she spends the next season of her life.

Therapy helps her come to better terms with her psyche, and we learn she continues to be literarily productive, though only when she is alone. She finally has a long-desired love affair in London, England, with a cad from America, and is devastated when he leaves.

The film ends in the 1960s on her return to New Zealand. The final scene shows her dancing to Chubby Checker's "The Twist." Alone.

This was a very moving and straight-forward movie that I thoroughly enjoyed. It's filled with many short snippets of scenes. One reviewer described it very aptly as a diary. Each burst is like a paragraph entry in a diary related to a particular time and place but quickly moving on to the next time and place.

Despite the numerous flaws of this movie, and unless one has half a brain or very poor taste, it's impossible to dislike this little gem.

Jane Campion has a real talent to coregraph the character's inner worlds on screen, and reveal them openly to the viewer. It's a very strange gift as it almost never uses obvious "tricks", I mean I find it difficult to explain the way she does this. The use of emotionally manipulative music is obvious, of course, but it doesn't even bother me, on the contrary I let myself go, which is amazing considering my allergy to manipulative scores. But anyway this use of music does NOT explain the emotional power of "Angel" or "Piano", it's only a contribution.

With all its weaknesses (mainly in the second act, in which the editing and continuity are awkward), "Angel" is another proof that cinema is indeed an art, and that making "art" cinema doesn't mean making artsy-fartsy movies for the snobbish. Here what we have as a result is real poetic power, not intellectual performance (though the latter was obviously needed to reach the goal..).

I'll always prize filmmakers that are able to put so much heart in what they do. We badly need them.

Oh and now that I've seen this one, I won't ever look at Jackson's derivative "Heavenly creatures" with the same awe.

I watched this story years ago and discovered the youth of Janet Frame and i was glad at the beginning. The beginning where we can see Janet as a little girl is full of life and animated.The little red-haired actress is funny with her hair and malice even if she has bad times at school especially with her teacher who punishes her for stealing money..We can see that Janet is oppressed and has no friends..So sad but she keeps her good mood and discovers books and literature and soon develops a passion for books and poems..then she is an adolescent and loves writing poems and studying but her life is marred by two tragedies ,the death of two of her siblings in a horrible way.She begins to change and feel depressed with maybe a feeling of guilt..Then in the next part Janet grew up and is a young adult portrayed by Kerry fox but things are getting complicated.Janet must work and begins to teach but she is awfully shy ,in a sick way and she has outbursts of anguish.Unfortunately she will be admitted in a psychiatrist ward and stay there for 8 years totally cut off from the outside world and considered like an abnormal person but she will continue to write which will save her. After this time i got bored of this film because it was too long and the character of Janet is quite lonely which made me think of a pathological woman ,unable to communicate and almost autistic. I think that this movie is sincerely too long and 30 minutes less would have been enough with a good end because the end is difficult to understand.It isn't a family movie neither like an entertainment but a study of character ,a psychological movie with oppressive moments.

Most biopics are usually pretty average, because they attempt to pack in every important moment in someone's life into 2 hours. This is a rare exception. It's a tragic tale of mental problems on the one hand, family problems, and yet also a rather optimistic and positive tale of success.

I think the script made Frame more vulnerable than she really was in real life. For instance, in the love scene, according to the book, she says she made up a host of previous lovers, which isn't in the movie.

The movie is colourful, delicate and very humorous. It's a rarely perfect blend of humour and tragedy, done to perfection. I much preferred this to The Piano. It's a long film, but you won't notice.

Slow start, great finish. Since I saw this on video I fast forwarded through a lot of the first sections. In much of the first 2/3's many scenes were so quick and enigmatically done that I wasn't sure what was happening or who the people were. Many other scenes were so drawn out and slow I was bored. I don't know why I slogged through it, but once it got to the adult portion it was fascinating and very moving.

From what I have seen on Jane Campion movies, she is much more visual than dialogue-based. Wonderful to watch, but often confusing.

Oddly enough this is my favorite Jane Campion film. It's simply told, and the Janet Frame story comes through clearly, not with the rawness or complexity of Janet Frame's writing, but still with an honesty and beauty that is a part of what's best about great New Zealand film-making. Grant Major (Lord of the Rings) also did the design and visually it's a great reflection of what New Zealand of a certain time was like. But basically it's the story that's remarkable, dealing with how society treats the insane (it's probably a precursor and better version of Girl Interrupted), and how artists and writers find themselves.

Jane Campion recreates the life of writer Janet Frame, a person with a difficult childhood and dramatic youth, chronically misunderstood by all, which creates a traumatized adult with a crippling coyness.

Campion is extremely gentle with her camera, and depicts with grace even the harshest moments, to the extent that it almost compromises the understanding of certain events. But after all we can't help but sympathize with poor Janet and feel relief with each of her smiles.

I think the movie is well made and acted, not boring despite its length, and visually inspired. It also manages to be uplifting in the end.

I loved this movie! i saw it in 1991 in Amsterdam while on vacation in a little dingy movie house that sold beer and it had dutch subtitles so it was quite an emotional and memorable feeling all the way around. I remember falling in love with everything about it. so heart wrenching. Some of the best acting i have ever seen.

All of the performances are amazing, but Kerry Fox should have won an Oscar! She was nothing short of brilliant. The little chubby red head girl (Alexia Keogh) was also outstanding and i was surprised no, shocked seeing she has no other credits on IMDb. She was better than any child star working in Hollywood today.

There are moments in the film that transcend motion picture film-making. Jane Campion is a serious artist as was Frame and it's truly a shame that so few people seem to know about it judging from the few user comments. I consider this film true cinematic art. I remember leaving the theater with my friend and not being able to speak it moved us so much. It haunted me in a way no film ever has before. Maybe it was being in Amserdam? Maybe it was the beer? No, it was the film.

158 minutes long – and for what? A quarter of the scenes could have been dropped because they took the story nowhere. Many of the remaining scenes applied the directorial maxim "go in late and come out early" to a destructive extreme. It was like being given clues to a cryptic crossword.

To be fair, the film started well. The first 20 minutes or so were acutely observed and well acted and directed, then it began going downhill with increasing speed.

It was no surprise to learn that the film is a cut-down version of a TV mini-series. I can only assume that the IMDb reviewers who enjoyed the film must have known of Janet Frame and her story. For those of us who knew neither, it was unexplained mystery piled on unexplained mystery.

It could be argued that a plus for the film was that it kept me watching to the end, but believe me, that was simply because I lived in (vain) hopes that all would suddenly be clarified with a satisfactory conclusion. But no. It just left me frustrated and deeply disappointed.

Superficially, this is a sort of "My Brilliant Career," meets "A Beautiful Mind."

It features one of the most extraordinary actresses, new to me. I saw her in "Intmacy" and had to find more. It is made by a talented and sometimes engaging filmmaker who explores how women are haunted. It is about a writer whose books don't grab me, but whose story does. She believed herself haunted.

The problem is that these three songs from different souls don't overlap that much.

Frame created written images that were teased out of a struggle with life, one that infused her. Her sanity came from the writing. She didn't write about insanity and marginalization, she wrote from them to counter and co-opt them somewhat. This engages the reader because most of us are afraid to go as deeply into the darkness as these visions indicate.

That's a different thing entirely than the story Campion has chosen to give us, which is about all the external agency that surrounded her. I cannot think of an instance where the literary kite and the cinematic string are in such different dimensions. Sure, its an interesting story that someone's light survived, I suppose. But we never see that light, or the ledges that were climbed, or the images that were carried out for us.

What's left for Fox to do is emote visually. She does an extraordinary job, quite apart from the fact that it is ineffective in this container. I really do think she's something — another of those Australian/New Zealand crowd that just seem to have something that is rare elsewhere.

She and the girls who play her younger selves are redheads. That's not at all a cinematic device, though it is used cleverly to mend the three actresses. Frame actually had that Clarabelle hair.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.