Susan Granger’s review of “Goya’s Ghosts” (Samuel Goldwyn)
In late18th century Spain, a Roman Catholic cleric, Brother Lorenzo (Javier Bardem), serves as an agent of the Inquisitor General (Michael Lonsdale). Their target is the painter Francisco Goya (Stellan Skarsgard), who is working on a portrait of Ines (Natalie Portman), the beautiful daughter of a wealthy merchant. Because Ines refuses to eat pork, they suspect that there’s Jewish blood in her ancestry. As a result, she is tortured and imprisoned in the church’s dungeon, where Lorenzo rapes her – after which, over dinner, he assures her father, Tomas Bilbatua (Jose Luis Gomez), that if Ines truly loved God, she would never sign a false confession.
Fifteen years later, the invading French Army vanquishes the Inquisition. Lorenzo has become Napoleon’s prosecutor. It’s sheer melodrama as the now-insane Ines tells him that she bore him a daughter whom Lorenzo discovers has become a prostitute (Portman – in a dual role).
Veteran Czech-born director Milos Forman (“Valmont,” “Amadeus,” “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”) has assembled an international cast, resulting in a polyglot of incomprehensible accents. To cast very Swedish Stellan Skarsgard as very Spanish Goya was a serious error. And Randy Quaid turns up as the violin-playing, dimwitted King Carlos IV with Queen Maria Luisa (Blanca Portillo) painted by Goya.
Collaborating on the soap opera-like political satire with Jean-Claude Carriere doesn’t help. Their sketchy script is awkward and stilted – with many vignettes revolving around “being put to the question,” a euphemism for torture – along with the assertion that, under duress, people will confess to anything. On the Granger Movie Gauge of 1 to 10, “Goya’s Ghosts” is a grotesque 4, completely lacking in emotional focus. Anytime you emerge from the theater praising the scenery more than the scenes, there’s a problem with the picture.
