Stax screenplay review of Enigma
Stax here with my reaction to the screenplay for Enigma! This 112-page draft includes revised pages dated April 12th, 2000, which was only five days before principal photography commenced in the United Kingdom. The original February 21st, 2000 draft was written by Oscar winner Tom Stoppard (Shakespeare in Love) with subsequent revisions made by Hannah Weg (who also penned the most recent adaptation of Criminal Conversation). Enigma is adapted from Robert Harris' mystery novel of the same name. It is now filming under the direction of Michael Apted (The World Is Not Enough) and stars Dougray Scott (M:I-2), Kate Winslet, Saffron Burrows (Deep Blue Sea), Jeremy Northam (Mimic), Corin Redgrave, Nicholas Rowe, and Nikolaj Coster-Waldau. Rocker Mick Jagger's company Jagged Edge is producing the film along with Saturday Night Live's Lorne Michaels and Broadway Video. Although no U.S. distributor has been secured yet, a 2001 release is expected.
Enigma is a romantic-thriller set in Britain during World War II. Brilliant but emotionally troubled cryptanalyst Tom Jericho (Scott) has returned to duty at the top secret Bletchley Park station after a controversial month-long respite. Tom had been having a brief but torrid affair with a fellow employee, the beautiful but "enigmatic" Claire Romilly (Burrows). Claire had numerous lovers at Bletchley Park and Tom, who didn't have much of a life since joining the war effort five years before, quickly became obsessed with her. When she broke off their affair, Tom grew despondent and assaulted his haughty superior Skynner (Redgrave?), an action that prompted his immediate removal from "Station X" for "medical reasons." But after only thirty days away, Tom Jericho is recalled to a now even more crisis-plagued Bletchley Park.
Tom, renowned for cracking the Nazis' earlier Enigma codes, must help decipher the Nazis' latest code before an armada of U-boats can attack a merchant shipping fleet carrying vital supplies. Just how did the Nazis gain this shocking newfound advantage in their intelligence? Obviously, there is a spy within Bletchley Park. Suspicion soon falls on Claire, who has been missing since the time the Nazi intelligence "blackout" began. But when evidence is discovered indicating that Claire was murdered, her (still obsessed) ex-lover Tom Jericho finds himself a suspect not only in her apparent death but also in possibly being the turncoat. Did Tom murder Claire? Was either of them the spy?
Tom sets out to crack the Nazis' new code with the assistance of Claire's innocent, bookish roommate Hester Wallace (Winslet), racing against time to unravel the mystery behind Claire's disappearance while also trying to prevent the Nazis' from attacking the vital merchant ships. Shadowing this unlikely duo is a cagey government operative named Wigram (Northam) who knows that they're up to something sneaky. Tom and Hester soon discover a vast conspiracy that reaches the highest levels of British government, as well as a growing attraction for each other.
Although I have yet to see it, I understand that U-571 covers some of the same ground as Enigma. Like the Robert Harris novel, U-571 is also concerned with the Nazi encryption devices that were held onboard U-boats. The Enigma machine was a brilliant invention that required some of the smartest minds in Britain in order to crack it. The problem with the Enigma device, which looked like a big typewriter with a Medusa's head of wires, is that the number of rotor positions it could be set to are almost infinite, thus making code-breaking virtually impossible. The British cryptanalysts, or code-breakers, had to use mathematics and "cribs" (clues derived from other Nazi messages and protocols) in order to crack the code.
Frankly, the science of all this code-breaking was quite mind-boggling and the script didn't try too hard to simplify things. In fact, the code-breaking sequences are so tediously complex that the story was often as indecipherable as a secret Nazi message. Given the late date of this draft, I figure that only on-set rewrites or future re-shoots can help make the plot clearer and more accessible to a mass audience. After Enigma, U-571, and the forthcoming Windtalkers, it is probably safe to assume that the code-breakers sub-genre of war movies will have run its course.
Overall, Stoppard and Weg did a decent job in addressing the two different plot lines (Tom's obsession with the missing Claire Romilly, and the code-breakers' race against time to decipher Enigma and save the merchant fleet). A good portion of Act Two focused on the code-breaking sub-plot; I became concerned that the screenplay had lost sight of the Tom-Claire relationship that was apparently so vital. But from the latter part of Act Two until the end, Claire's mysterious fate again became the focus of the story. Still, there were times when I became restless. The code-breaking plot line was dense with technical details and description. As with the many recent incarnations of Star Trek, characters exchanged a lot of jargon-filled chatter that I may not have often understood but their concerned reactions were enough to make me buy into all the drama.
By Act Three, the script became more and more expository. Several scenes consisted of characters standing around holding guns on each other and saying why they did what they did. It was very much like an old movie, especially film noir pictures, where one guy in a trench coat pulls a revolver on another guy in a trench coat and yammers, "Sorry, Johnny, but this is how it has to be. I had to do it, you see, I had to ¿", etc. As a confused reader, I appreciated the storytellers erring on the side of caution and just spilling the beans; but as a writer, I recognized that the story had now become rather contrived.
Claire's affair with Tom, like so much of Enigma, is related in flashback. The first fifteen pages alone were very difficult to understand because of the all the inter-cutting between various memories. The images and clues that were revealed in these scenes are eventually explained, the flashbacks having been used primarily to relate Tom's affair with Claire and to introduce the elements of the grand conspiracy that Tom and Hester would discover later.
Claire, seen mostly in flashback, is one of those characters that everyone in a story says is so important and colorful but whose on-screen actions don't seem all that memorable. Much of the success of her character will depend on Saffron Burrows; hopefully, she will give Claire more dimension than was evident on the page. Claire reminded me of Greta Scacchi's character in Presumed Innocent. Like that doomed mistress, Claire is the sexually promiscuous, captivating woman in the hero's otherwise bland, workaholic life. Her tragic end casts suspicion on the protagonist. As with Harrison Ford's jealous ex-lover in Presumed Innocent, Tom Jericho's behavior makes him the likeliest suspect in her murder and, like Rusty Sabich, Tom's brooding triggers off flashbacks to his tumultuous affair. How far Tom may have gone to win Claire's love, and how far he went to keep from losing her, is what drove this mystery forward.
There were also shades of Alfred Hitchcock's films here. Claire's tragic party girl with a past reminded me somewhat of Ingrid Bergman in Notorious. And Claire's haunting presence throughout the entire story also recalled the never-seen title character in Rebecca, whose mysterious death overshadowed all that transpired. Hester reminded me of the frumpy female sidekicks that "Hitch" would have sidle up to his male heroes. If Tom Jericho is like James Stewart in Vertigo, which this story owes a lot to, then Claire is Kim Novak and Hester is Barbara Bel Geddes. Even more so than the forthcoming "Hitchcockian" film Phone Booth, Enigma warrants such artsy comparisons.
Unlike the James Bond series or the Mission: Impossible films, Enigma is more like the spy flicks of yesteryear that relied on plot machinations rather than action sequences. That is why the script's mano a mano finale is so at odds with the rest of the story; there is also an inexplicable car chase in the middle of Act Two. The climax has Jericho in a fist fight aboard a motorboat while bombers and U-boats close in; this ending was more akin to Face/Off than to an old-fashioned spy yarn.
My biggest fear about Enigma is that the final film will suffer from terminal inertia not unlike Tom Stoppard's prior adaptation of a best-selling romantic thriller, The Russia House. I have tried to sit through that film three times now but have fallen asleep each time. While I like its cast and appreciate its intellectual qualities, there is no denying that The Russia House is just downright boring and confusing. It never quite lived up to its potential given all the talent involved. This could easily happen with Enigma if the filmmakers don't keep the audience emotionally involved with the characters.
What I appreciated most about Enigma was that its protagonists were smart but flawed people who relied on their wits and skills in order to succeed. How many other genre films lately have had a mathematician as the hero?! Even though its plot often stymied me, I enjoyed Enigma for its intrigue and moody tone. The subject matter was rich and the depiction of behind-the-scenes life at Bletchley Park was fascinating for a history buff like myself. Enigma is one of several screenplays I have reviewed recently that were adaptations of books that I haven't yet read. But unlike The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy or Danger Girl, Enigma made me want to read the original source material. That is one of the many goals of any film adaptation and this script succeeded at that. While I still harbor specific grievances about this script, I believe that fans of cerebral thrillers will likely enjoy Enigma. -- STAX
All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt. (Charles M. Schulz)
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