THE COMFORT OF STRANGERS

US, 1990, 107 minutes, Colour.
Natasha Richardson, Rupert Everett, Christopher Walken, Helen Mirren.
Directed by Paul Schrader.

The Comfort of Strangers is set in Venice, with the focus on a very ordinary English couple on holidays (Natasha Richardson and Rupert Everett). But there is sinister suggestions (surveillance and photos), darkness in the Venice light. By seeming chance they are befriended by a local aristocrat (Christopher Walken) who invites them home to meet his wife (Helen Mirren). The film then becomes more sinister its innocence destroyed.

The film has strong credentials: novel by Ian Mc Ewan, screenplay by Harold Pinter, direction by Paul Schrader. Audiences expecting Schrader's usual vividness and flamboyance need to know that the film is quite restrained for him, perhaps rendered more cerebral by Pinter's enigmatic style. It is an intriguing portrait of innocence and evil, stylishly presented.

1. Impact of the psychological drama, human nature, pessimism?

2. The title and its ironies? For each couple?

3. The Venice settings, the beauty and the tradition, brightness and darkness, day and night, new world and old world, decay? People being lost in Venice? The interiors, the Palazzi? Venice as an environment? The musical score, the Italian operatic songs?

4. Audience expectations, the characters, interactions, twists? The novel, the screenplay by Harold Pinter with the emphasis on sparse dialogue, sinister meanings within the banal? Paul Schrader and his portraits of good and evil?

5. Colin and Mary, their characters, a nice couple, British background, the quality of their relationship, the return to its origins in Venice, their hopes? The encounter with Robert and Carolyn? Tourists, hotels and restaurants? Their personal lives, sexual relationship? Mary and the phone calls and concern about her children? Colin's detachment, seeming lack of energy? The decisions to be made?

6. The irony of the surveillance, the photos, enigmas and puzzles? Robert, the chance meetings, his hospitality? The gallery of photos at home? Robert as a voyeur of his victims?

7. The couple lost, the time and the night, the encounter with Robert? Going to the restaurant, the gay bar and its environment? His instance, his courtesy, the consequences of their accepting his invitation?

8. Robert, the introduction to the film, the stately tracking sequences, the palazzi, the music? The little boy and his family? The father and his severity and discipline? Authority? The voice over of Robert and his stories? Family, relationships, identity? the stories? The odd influence on him? The Italian diplomatic background?

9. Colin and Mary, the first encounter, lost, seeking help, the terrors of the Venice night? Bewilderment? Sleeping in the open? Sick? The effect on their spirits? The encounter with Robert and Carolyn, going into their home? The clothes disappearing, their sleeping, watched over by Carolyn? Wanting to leave, wanting to stay? The awkwardness of the meal? Robert assaulting Colin? Yet the effect on themselves the feeling of liberation, their personal and sexual encounter?

10. The portrait of Robert and Carolyn, as a couple, elegant and suave, decadence? Carolyn's injuries and her explanations? Voyeurs? The decision to leave - and its dire consequences?

11. The accidental going into their home? The repercussions? Mary, the assault and her being drugged? Voyeur to Colin's death? The photos? Audience expectations, the abrupt violence of Colin's murder? The blood, sacrificial? Violent and sexual? The effect on Robert? On Carolyn? Their disappearance?

12. The finale, Mary’s' world destroyed, the police and their interrogation, the relevance and irrelevance, of their questions? Mary amazed and dazed?

13. The portrait of the two couples, similarity and contrasts, mirror images and distortions? The imprisonment of Venice? Execution?

14. The style of the film: visually, verbally - suggestions and restraint, the sudden shock of the ending, the pregnant phraseology of the banal and the commonplace? Perversity and darkness? Victims? The death of innocence?