Review – The English Patient

So if one works hard enough at it, both war and sex can be rendered dull beyond description. They’ve got the cast (Ralph Fiennes, Juliette Binoche, Willem Dafoe, Kristin Scott Thomas, Naveen Andrews etc.) and they’ve got the art direction. But oh that awful script. The story ping-pongs back and forth between a nurse (Binoche) caring for a burn victim (Fiennes) with a mysterious past and that mysterious past unfolding ever so slowly. Is he a German spy? Is he the secret love of an officer’s wife (Thomas)? Is he an adulterer and a spy? The character development is bad enough that it’s hard to care. This is a pretty picture, but the visuals don’t make up for the weak writing and certainly don’t sustain the two-and-a-half-hour running time. See if desperate