Last night after I dried off and had some dinner, I cooked up a pop of popcorn and put the Talented Mr. Ripley on. There are a few movies out there in the world that I can watch again and again and Ripley is one of them. I think this movie is really underappreciated. It got skunked at the Oscars despite standout performances from Jude Law, Gwenyth Paltrow, Cate Blanchett and especially Matt Damon, who in a tour de force performance as the tormented Tom Ripley, is in virtually every scene in this movie. Ripley also includes a stand out job from probably the most talented actor working today, Philip Seymour Hoffman, who lights up the screen as the philandering Freddie Miles.

Then there is the incredible backdrop of Italy on the canvas of some of the best jazz tracks ever created from Dizzie Gillespie, Chet Baker, Charlie Parker & Miles Davies, just to name a few, all right there on the cutting edge in 1958. There was an incredible energy of cool. All this wicked jazz music is complimented with a score of haunting beauty by Gabriel Yared and set against classical music that creates a wonderful tension throughout the movie.

Ripley also evokes the great films of post-war Italy by Fellini, Rossellini, et al. There are homage's to Henri Cartier-Bresson in some of the transitional scenes. One of the great aspects of this movie is that it is actually better than the book by Patricia Highsmith. But it's so much better it's not even a contest. Ripley also has one of the best lines ever to come off the screen: "There's female intuition and then there are the facts."

But this isn't why I like this movie so much. I like it because it is classic film noir in the best possible sense.

Anthony Minghella takes us on a roller coaster of a movie which starts at the end and is all flashback, a la Sunset Boulevard. Thomas Ripley invites us into the story with his refrain of, "if I could just go back wipe everything out, starting with myself" and then takes down this labyrithine plot over which he seemingly has no control.

Sometimes I feel the same way myself.