The Serpent's Kiss
| The Serpent's Kiss | |
|---|---|
| File:Serpentskissdvd.jpg | |
| Directed by | Philippe Rousselot |
| Written by | Tim Rose Price |
| Starring | Ewan McGregor Greta Scacchi Pete Postlethwaite |
Release date | 1997 |
Running time | 104 min. |
| Country | U.K. / France / Germany |
| Language | English |
The Serpent's Kiss (Fr. Le Baiser du serpent, Ge. Der Schlangenkuss) is a 1997 film directed by Philippe Rousselot. It is a story about a Dutch garden architecht named Meneer Chrome (Ewan McGregor) who has been hired by a wealthy metalworker (Pete Postlethwaite) to create an extravagant garden. The film also starts Greta Scacchi and Richard E. Grant.
Plot Summary
Thomas Smithers (Postlethwaite), who has made his fortune in metalwork, hires Meneer Chrome (McGregor), a famous garden designer, to create the most extravagent garden imaginable out of his wild property. However, Chrome has already been employed by Fitzmaurice (Grant), the cousin of Smithers' wife Juliana (Scacchi), for the purpose of bankrupting Smithers. Fitzmaurice's purpose in this is to take back Juliana as his lover, but she becomes attracted to Chrome, who is falling in love with Anne, the Smithers' mysterious daughter. Anne, however, is contemptuous of Chrome (and, indeed, of everyone she meets, filtering them and everything else around her through the poems of Andrew Marvell); her parents subject her to numerous "treatments," thinking her mentally unstable and wishing to cure her. These treatments cause Chrome to pity her, outbursting to the Puritan doctor at one point, "You're sick, she's not! Cure yourself!"
As the garden grows increasingly more complex and Smithers approaches bankruptcy, Fitzmaurice realizes that Chrome's affection for Anne is making him a liability; first he threatens to reveal Chrome's true identity to Smithers, then he plots to kill him. Fitzmaurice's plan backfires, however, and he falls victim to his own poison. Juliana abandons her adulterous intentions, which her husband remains unaware of, and turns to support Smithers, who is bankrupt from his garden project obsession. Anne and Chrome, revealed to be Chrome's assistant, go to the sea together where Anne throws away her book of poetry.
Trivia
- Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman met while filming the film. The pair became best friends and would eventually undertake the motorcycle journey documented in Long Way Round.
- Part of the film was shot in the County Clare village of Sixmilebridge in the Republic of Ireland.
External links
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