Barney's Version

Director: Richard J. Lewis

Writers: Michael Konyves, Mordechai Richler (author)

Starring: Paul Giamatti, Rosamund Pike, Dustin Hoffman

Release Date: December 24, 2010

Length: 2 hours 12 minutes

The adaptation and release of Mordechai Richler’s classic, Barney’s Version has been highly anticipated and long awaited. Fans of the novel have either been waiting for this day to approach since reading it or have feared the day the story would not translate well onto screen. There is a lot of pressure on a film like this to be made in the right way and all the questions need to be asked. Did director Richard J. Lewis convey the essence of the novel on screen? Did Screenwriter Michael Konyves capture the Canadian Jewishness from the book in the characters? And finally did Paul Giamatti do justice to our favourite lovable schmuck, Barney Panofsky? The movie starts off with middle-aged, hard-drinking Barney already thrice divorced. He runs into an old acquaintance at a bar who has just released a book describing the murder Barney should have been committed for twenty five years ago. After arguing and wittily telling him off, that Barney does so frequently, Barney spirals into the memories of how he remembers his life and his version of the story. We dive into his past with his adventurous best friend, Boogie, his crazy lovable father, Izzy and his three very different wives; the whimsical Clara, the exasperating second Mrs. Panofsky and the beloved apple of his eye, Miriam. Every fear and every worry that this movie would not be faithful to the book or enjoyable in the same way was squelched within the first five minutes of the film. Screenwriter Michael Konyves beautifully condensed Barney’s whole life from the novel into two perfect hours. Even when important characters only had two or three short scenes, they still came across to the audience as vital people in Barney’s life. For example, when the character of Clara is introduced, she is already pregnant and about to marry Barney the next day. At first, I was a little peeved there wasn’t more back-story to her character but soon realized the film incredibly caught the significance of her and Barney’s relationship within six short minutes. Something else that was effective about this adaptation was the interesting changes to the story and setting of the film taken from the original book. For example, the novel spans his life from the 1950’s to the 1990’s, when the book was released. The film bumped everything up 20 years to make it current. Also, in the novel, although Barney grows up and loves Montreal, he moves to Toronto later in his life with Miriam. In the film, Toronto is changed to New York City as Toronto in the book is not important and may as well be any other popular North American city. These choices made the film globally appealing to those who haven’t read or heard of the original novel while still keeping it close to home for the fans, with Barney’s love for Montreal and hockey. What makes a great adaptation from a novel are a carefully altered story that this film clearly had and a phenomenal cast to bring those beloved characters to life. There are many crucial characters in Barney’s Version that need to be done accurately and every actor given a character in this film performed that task exceptionally. Whether it was Dustin Hoffman with his hilarious dirty-mouthed performance as Barney’s loving, close father or Minnie Driver, with her nailed down Montreal Jewish accent as Barney’s neurotic second wife, every actor was a joy to watch. Rachele Lefevre’s performance as Clara was undeniably one of the best in the film. The audience knew that because she only had, as mentioned before, a few short moments on screen at the beginning of the film and you still remembered her at the end. British actress Rosamund Pike wonderfully captured the understanding beautiful character of Miriam from the novel. Her relationship with Barney on screen was the same in the book, in that you know she is the most important person in his life because she puts up with all his shtick and will always love Barney for his big heart. She encapsulates that essence of perfection that the character of Miriam always has in Barney’s mind. Wonderful performances also came from Canadian actors Scott Speedman as Boogie, Bruce Greenwood as Blair, Miriam’s second husband, and Saul Rubinek as Charnofsky, Clara’s father. The greatest performance of this film and by far one of the best performances of the year was Paul Giamatti as the man himself, Barney Panofsky. He kept the same personality of Barney from the book, while incorporating his own slight take on the character and carries the entire movie so well. One of the best qualities of this character in the book is that Mordechai Richler does the best job of making us love him and hate him constantly. Giamatti does the exact same thing, if not more so than Richler’s writing. Director Richard J. Lewis and producer Robert Lantos, who was a close friend of Richler’s, give us a touching adaptation of Richler’s classic masterwork and by far one of the best films of the year. Do not miss out on Barney’s Version.