The English Patient (1996)
The English Patient (1996)
(Anthony Minghella, US/UK 1996, 162 min., 35mm)
In this retelling of the Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice set during the final days of the Italian Campaign of World War II, Hana (Juliette Binoche), a French-Canadian nurse of the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps, gains permission from her unit to move into a bombed-out Italian monastery, to look after a dying, critically burned man, Almásy (Ralph Fiennes), who speaks English but says he cannot remember his name. They are soon joined by Kip (Naveen Andrews) from the British Army and David Caravaggio (Willem Dafoe), a member of the Canadian Intelligence Corps. As Hana cares for Almásy, he begins to share his life story through a series of flashbacks.