The Passion of Ayn Rand

This was an entertaining, thought-provoking movie. This film will be a valuable resource for the ingenue researching Ayn Rand's life and work for the first time. The film succeeds because it portrays Ayn Rand's character in all of its complexity without emphasizing any one single as- pect.

Some of Miss Rand's devotees may find this production oversexu- alized, but as someone familiar with her life and work, I find the account of her behavior and her thinking to be consistent with much of what I've read about her and heard in interviews. Considering Ayn Rand's passion for the consistency of principle and action, this film is in no way disparaging to her in character, even while it may not be as compli- mentary as some would like.

In fact, this movie may become an important historical resource for those who are unfamiliar with Miss Rand's life and work and want to research her. Like many outstanding biographies, this production provides a well-rounded view of her character and philosophy. It leaves the viewer, as the historian, to draw her or his own conclusions about the strength or weakness of Miss Rand's character, without in- doctrinating her point of view. This movie is an accurate and fair por- trayal of a woman who often incited controversy with her powerful commitment to the consistency of her actions with her ideals.

I read Atlas Shrugged in 1964 and thought I'd discovered Atlantis or something. I learned that a friend had seen Ayn Rand speak at Ford Hall Forum was also excited by her ideas. It was a couple years before we learned that there had been a split between Ayn Rand, Nathaniel and Barbara Branden -and many more years before we learned the split had occurred years before we were told about it. (And it was clear that information was covered up, repressed for years.)

So when Barbara Branden came out with, The Passion Of Ayn Rand, and it later was made into the movie - I paid attention and compared what was presented with my memories. Most of what is in the movie corresponds to what I remember. I like the movie's frankness for it shows how damaging Rand was to other people's relationships and how disappointed she was with the men in her circle who consistently fell short of her fictional male characters.

It is notable that every biography of Rand starts with her terrible experience under the Soviets - but none make much of that experience's role in forming Rand's later attitudes and philosophical stance. Her resultant "anti-collectivism" is completely valid on its face but in practice it becomes an excuse for rank selfishness and coldness toward "inferior people."

Rand's fascination with men as fantasy heroes and sexual controllers of women has always been evident and was acknowledged by Rand herself. It is never mentioned how this contradicts Rand's forcefully promoted "principles." She punished all who violated her rules but never thought her own transgressions affected how she should be regarded as one promoting a moral system.

The movie should be seen by all those who have read Rand's works and know at least something of her actual history. It provides the balance of her human flaws to offset the alleged purity of her ideals. A balance she as a writer never accomplished.

I saw this film three times (but then, I see many films more than once), and if I were to rate it, I'd give it 7-8 (out of 10), for its artistic merits. I knew nothing about Ayn Rand before seeing this film, and it piqued my curiosity. (I then discovered that "The Fountainhead", a very good piece of cinematic work, was based on her book.) But I am basically writing this only to correct what a reviewer said (back in September 2001), quite emphatically and with considerable reasoning behind the statement: that Ayn Rand shouldn't have been portrayed by an "American actress". She wasn't. The role of Ayn Rand was played by Helen Mirren, a truly great British actress. Moreover, Ms. Mirren herself is of Russian extraction, just as Ayn Rand was.

"Ayn Rand wouldn't like this movie" said director Christopher Menaul prior to its premier at the Sundance Film Festival. Based on the biography by Barbara Braden, this film focuses on the later years of Ayn's life and her affair with an associate. It would be a difficult task to make a movie that would focus on the genius of Ayn Rand. It is necessary to read her books to find this. Her real passion was for freedom and creativity, a result of being an immigrant to America from post-Revolutionary Russia. Instead, this film covers the sexual passion, which is only a minute element of the complexity of Ayn Rand. Her background, books and Objectivism philosophy are only given brief mention peripheral to the sexual involvement. Approaching it this way does create a more commercial result. It was produced by Showtime, so it probably will not be released to theaters, but should appear on cable soon.

The acting in this movie was outstanding and makes it more memorable. Of particular merit are Julie Delpy as Barbara Braden and Peter Fonda accurately portraying the meek Frank O'Connor.

A movie should be judged by whether it is the best product that can be created by the elements being used. On this basis, it succeeds.

This dramatization of about 17 years in the mid-life of novelist Ayn Rand focuses on her intimate relationship with one of her much younger disciples, one Nathaniel Blumenthal, who changed his last name to Branden (get it? – bRANDen) after establishing a platonic friendship with the author. Eventually the relationship evolved into a love affair with the full if resentful knowledge of their mutual spouses. Although the heart of the film is the love relationship we are also introduced to the social circle of the controversial Rand whose novels featured larger-than-life heroes whose glaring individuality and egoism pit them against the common mass, or "second handers" as Rand called them; she elevated personal selfishness to a high ethical principle, and revered the capitalist way of life. The film is set during the period when Rand was writing her last mammoth novel, ATLAS SHRUGGED, which she believed would rock the world and spark a revolution of human creativity and a rebirth of individualism and entrepreneurial, creative spirit. When it became a mere best seller she was shattered and in her demoralized state allowed the young Blumenthal to influence her next career move by founding the Objectivist movement which carried her message in the form of a periodic newsletter and public meetings. Through the device of capturing snatches of conversation at dinners and small meetings as well as question-and-answer sessions at public gatherings, the film takes the time to explore the mind-set of the Rand followers, including the ugly confrontations within the innermost circle as members are emotionally humiliated for not uttering the correct Objectivist formulations in deadly group meetings in Rand's smoke-filled living room. The cult atmosphere is well captured. But the "passion" here is heavily on the sexual-romantic side and lacking in the arena of philosophy. The makers of this film probably felt the TV audience wouldn't sit still for too much cerebral content so some may wonder why people felt so strongly about Rand that they would attach themselves to her the way her followers did.

But the real power in this TV movie comes across in the four central performances by Helen Mirren as Ayn Rand, Peter Fonda as her passive, dispirited, alcoholic husband, the always excellent Eric Stolz as "Branden" and Julie Delpy as his long-suffering wife. Each of these excellent actors has mastered the art of "less is more" in conveying depth of emotion with a minimum of hamminess and take the viewer inside the cult mentality. Rand could easily have been depicted as a monster but Mirren and the screenwriters take care to show us her vulnerable side. You have to admire her whether you agree with her or not. She was a tragic figure worth exploring. Her novels still sell in the hundreds of thousands of copies many decades after their initial release because there is a kernel of truth in what she wrote, something about the value of the individual and the beauty of reason. What she made of those truths is debatable.