Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
This film is an adaptation of John Berendts best selling novel and is directed by Clint Eastwood. The story is based on a series of true events involving an antique dealer named Jim Williams, played by Kevin Spacey. John Kelso, played by John Cusack, is a small time journalist sent down to Savannah to cover one of William's elaborate Christmas parties for Town and Country magazine. Already we are beginning to see some similarities between Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil and my first text, The Keepers of Truth written by Michael Collins. Kelso like Bill, the main character from my first text is a journalist and is relatively unknown. Both characters seem to spend their time writing up pointless articles, which have no real significance to getting them anywhere where they want to be with their writing career. However in both texts a murder is the story that they have been looking for. In Bill's case it was Ronny Lawton killing his old man and in the case of Kelso it was Jim Williams shooting his young male hustler lover. Both characters see these events as the break they have been waiting for and as something that could give their career the boost that it needs. Kelso plans to write a book about the whole incident and decid
Having some family background in art Kelso examines it and remarks that a section of it has been painted over and asks Williams if he has had it x-rayed. I think Eastwood has used this character so extensively to reinforce the quirkiness of the town and its inhabitants. However in Midnight the reasons why seem to be different. In The Keepers of Truth Bills dad shoots himself after life in this dying town becomes too hard for him to cope with. This same sort of mentality can be seen in The Keepers of Truth from Teri towards Bill. There are two sides of Savannah portrayed to us by Eastwood. Like the man who walks an imaginary dog everyday because the real dog died several years ago these characters are all placed to provide the viewer with some background Savannah folklore. The thing that immediately sprang to Jims mind was the car. In the way that Kelso falls for Mandy, Bill falls for Teri. Married straight out of college he became divorced when the woman he was married to realised that his first novel was not going to be a bestseller. Although this is not one of the main concerns of this text it still implies that there must be a major force causing these men to do such a thing. " She is again intended to be an example of the town's inhabitants but I don't think that her role is as successful as Eastwood wanted it to be. Upon Kelso's inspection of this party the viewer can see a gleam of sweat upon the brows of men and women wearing light dresses. This brings up another similarity. Another connection between the two texts can be made because of the fact that both Bill and Kelso are relatively unsuccessful writers.
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Acceptance Essays
