Film

Heaven (2001)

Director: Tom Tykwer

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Kieslowski died in 1996 while planning a Heaven/ Purgatory/Hell trilogy with his long-term collaborator Piesiewicz; they'd done a 30-page outline for Heaven, now filmed in Italy by a gaggle of EU producers and a German director (for Miramax). Against all odds, it's faithful to the spirit of Kieslowski - and terrifically good. Philippa (Blanchett), an English teacher in Turin, is arrested for planting a bomb that killed four innocent bystanders. Her claim that she was targeting a drug czar is ignored by everyone except Filippo (Ribisi), a young cop who volunteers to translate for her, outwits his corrupt superiors - and ends up helping her to escape and kill the bad guy after all. Moral, social and political questions are bundled inextricably together in a fast on-the-run narrative that plays like a sun-drenched film noir. Blanchett isn't quite up to Philippa's wrenching inner conflicts, but Ribisi is brilliant as the boy who imagines piloting a helicopter straight up to heaven, a place he already knows in his heart.

---

• 
•