"Ripley's Game," starring John Malkovich as cold-blooded killer Tom Ripley, may be the best American movie never theatrically released here.
Malkovich is creepier than usual in this elegant adaptation of Patricia Highsmith's third of five Ripley novels. His Ripley is some 20 years older than the one portrayed by Matt Damon in The Talented Mr. Ripley. He is now an accomplished killer and thief, living large in a grand Italian villa. After being hired to kill a Russian gangster, Ripley convinces a terminally ill neighbor that it would be in his survivors' financial interest if he took the assignment instead.
Ripley's employer (Ray Winstone, so good in Sexy Beast) makes the mistake of double-crossing the suave sociopath, who now must fend off the slain gangster's henchmen. The newly bloodied neighbor volunteers to protect Ripley, who's made him a pawn in a dangerous game.
No one does decadence and deceit better than Malkovich, and writer-director Liliana Cavani lets him chew as much of the scenery as he can digest. If Ripley's Game had been released in theaters before going straight to the IFC channel, Malkovich would have been a shoo-in for an Oscar nomination.
The U.S. opening was postponed several times. Then, it was put on the shelf, while the producers and distributor tried to work out their differences. Everyone involved refuses to comment on the affair, so it's still a mystery how the release was so mishandled.
Not surprisingly, the DVD is a bare-boned product. The movie, though, is well worth owning or renting, especially in combination with The American Friend, Wim Wenders' adaptation of the same novel; the French-language Purple Noon, René Clément's take on The Talented Mr. Ripley; and Alfred Hitchcock's 1951 version of Highsmith's Strangers on a Train, with a script co-written by famed detective writer Raymond Chandler.