The Bridges of Madison County: review

Release date: 1995

French title:  Sur la route de Madison

Book by Robert James Waller

Movie by Clint Eastwood starring himself and Meryl Streep

What I remember most about this movie are the tears and the ugly cry (perhaps because I'm a girl) ;) 

            It's the story of a woman, Francesca, that is trapped in her life with a husband and kids. She lives for them, not for her. One day, a photographer, named Robert, and working for the National Geographic, arrives in her little town of Iowa. That man is literally like a breath of fresh air. He represents something new, something exciting, something out of the boredom of her life. She feels free, loved, cherished for her, not for what she's doing everyday. This movie is all about passion but within a hard reality.

          The movie follows the classical path of a love story...it starts with an unhappy relationship, a housewife lost and in despair and suddenly the savior arrives. The pace of the movie is following the rules: it starts slowly, you learn to appreciate each character and you already know something's about to happen between them. It's inevitable...and yet, in this movie at some point nothing's seem so sure. Francesca hesitates, she thinks it's bad to do it, to cheat on her husband. She doesn't want to unleash her pulsions, her feelings even though she knows she's already his.

The character of Clint is quite mysterious. We know little about his past, except that he is divorced. We don't know much about his current situation. We just know he's a photographer passing by. His presence is ephemere, we can feel it. We know it can't last. Plus, he also stayed as a secret this all time, until her death. That's painful but beautiful because it turns out he was the only one, the only thing that was hers and only hers and who saw what was truly inside her heart. 

            Actually, the last scene was SOoooo intense when we can see her grabbing the handle inside the car....we think she's gonna go, join the guy but no... and the tears, at this moment, represent the love disappering, the return to a normal common life.

She wanted to be a free spirit, to discover the world we guess...through him she's been able to see it as he travelled around.

She wanted to be listened to, she wanted her feelings to be heard...through him it became possible as he was a listener, a thinker.

She wanted to be seen as a woman, not as a wife or as a mother...through him she was the most beautiful one on earth, he'd only had eyes for her.

She wanted to leave...and yet she stayed. Her conscious was stronger and from now on she would only leave through her dreams and memories of him.

             It was only four days but it felt like an eternity because of the sincerity of that relationship, the desire and the intensity. You only feel that way once in your life and not many can testify. It's like a living dream but in the end reality strikes and she can't bear losing her family. It turns out the movie is very mature and it's not some kind of dream or idealized relationship. It happened yes...but now what? Am I just gonna abandonned what I've worked for all these last years? leave my children? Not sure...

But this is why this movie is so heartbreaking because you hope she leaves with him, they are so attached to each other but you also realize that she has to stay somehow. I guess it's also anchored with the time period because nowadays I don't think a woman would be scared or would hesitate that much to just leave and go some place else. Here, Francesca's moral and values are undoubtedly very strong. She's a woman of character. But by not leaving she once again falls into that scheme of family first and then her sake. She's devoted to this family but no one in it seems to see that she erased herself by doing it. After all, as she says in the movie living in a farm and as a housewife wasn't her dream as a young girl.

          As for the movie itself, there's no special effect, the movie is very quiet. Silences are well chosen, the script is well handled. It's about observation and it's smooth and slow. A real classic.

In the end, the moral of the story would be two people meeting at the right moment, at the middle of their respective lives, who are consumed by their love for each other but nonetheless don't forget about the outside world and their everyday life. It's about falling in love and about how to let go this love in order to not hurt and make her family unhappy. 

Some quotes from the movie:

"I don't want to need you"

"If that happens then you'll have to decide because I can't"

"I've never said it before but this kind of certainty comes but just once in a lifetime"

"[without him] a task would present itself like a lifesaver" 

"I realized love won't obey our expectations. Its mystery is pure and absolute"