TV Times

TV Times

‘Mona Lisa Smiles’ amidst big movies
By Harinda Vidanage
As Hollywood block busters rolled out into cinemas creating huge profits and keeping the capitalist money machine rumbling like a supercharged torpedo a very different type of movie managed to surface amidst the block buster blockade to the cine world. “Mona Lisa Smile” is one of those movies where heart and head clash and neither wins. A period women’s picture directed by Mike Newell

This movie created by Anastas Michos at Wellesley College and at sites around Columbia and Yale, opens on Katherine Watson (Julia Roberts), heading into her first job as an instructor in Art History. Politically liberal, she bumps hard against the culture of Wellesley which, despite its location in the heartland of the progressive state of Massachusetts is bogged down in the regressive politics of the period. The school is for women only, only white faces are on exhibit, and the student body comes across as well-heeled to a fault. Julia Roberts portrays an art teacher who gets a job at the prestigious Wellesley School for girls in the 1950s. She’s hip and cool, coming from California.

“Mona Lisa Smile” does offer a loving, amusingly detailed re-creation of the styles and music of the Eisenhower era, as well as a stellar ensemble of actresses playing the mostly WASP upper-class students and wives-to-be in Katherine’s first Wellesley class. Decked out in confining ’50s girdles, bras and prejudices, the actresses are fun especially Julia Stiles as budding lawyer Joan Brandwyn, Maggie Gyllenhaal as class tart Giselle Levy, Ginnifer Goodwin as socially challenged Connie Baker, and Kirsten Dunst as rich-witch nemesis Betty Warren.

Julia Roberts discovers that it’s actually some bizarre Nazi training camp with but one sole purpose in mind. And that’s to prep these girls in the fundamentals of housewivery. All that these whirling dervishes want to achieve in life is a husband and the ability to keep him happy. Instead of studying physics and the American Judicial System, our harlots are more interested in learning how to cook, clean, and give one mean handjob in the backseat of a boat-sized Buick. Sounds good to me, where can I sign my girl up? In an in depth interview about her new movie Roberts says a sense of humor keeps her grounded; she isn’t always reminded that she commands $20 million a picture, so she isn’t always pressured to out-do her “Erin Brockovich” best actress Oscar-winning performance, and she isn’t always reminded that paparazzi always follow her and her husband, cameraman Daniel Moder, after their one-year marriage.

“Life isn’t so crazy, really, I try to be indifferent to it,” Roberts says. “Being famous is not something one does.” Nevertheless, the 36-year-old actress is at the top of her game, constantly listed in the “Most Beautiful” and “Most Powerful” lists of Hollywood heavyweights. Dressed for an interview in a sheer white shirt and tan slacks — with a lot of tissues handy — Roberts looks glamorous despite her cold. It’s tough to imagine this superstar comparing holiday turkey recipes with fellow Oscar winner Marcia Gay Harden.

Although it seems the film is about feminism, Roberts sees it as a reminder that women didn’t always have such freedom. “It makes me appreciate women before me who fought for the situation that allowed me the opportunities I have now.” She says she has had great teachers, but points out, “It’s not just great teachers that shape your life but the absence of great teachers, sometimes being ignored is just as good as just being lauded.”

The movie managed to hang on to the top five and was well accepted at a time when the hype about The Last Samurai and the seasons mega hit the final episode of the Rings trilogy ‘The return of the King’ was released. Mona Lisa Smile is the more classic type of movie with a deep running essence portraying the hidden aspects of the docile ideology women in a time of so called progress.

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