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Mona Lisa is a pretty solid example of a great film that gets slightly derailed by an ending that feels entirely at odds with everything that has happened before it. Here is a film about two people who bicker, argue, team-up to rescue a lost soul, encounter dangerous people at every turn, and yet it still manages to end on a note of happiness. This feels wrong.
Other than this one problem, all of the necessary components are running at their highest capacity to make a great film. The film’s script smartly reveals its many twists and turns through small hints and slowly evolving relationship dynamics between the two main characters. Neil Jordan and David Leland’s dialog is also a thing of beauty, taking the British gangster vernacular and twisting it around into a street-tough poetry. The way the arguments unfold between this low-level British gangster and the high-class hooker he’s tasked with driving around and protecting are wildly entertaining. Once they understand how much they’re entertained by and look forward to their squabbles, they’re finally on the same page as us.
Jordan, who also directs, uses his camera to tremendous effect. His moody lighting creates an atmosphere that surrounds the goings on and makes for interesting viewing. Think of way Michael Caine’s dangerous gangster lit to look like the king of the underworld. Caine’s features appear distorted like Satan himself, here to charm us with promises while concealing ulterior motives behind the smile and eyes. He also exhibits tight control over when and how information unravels to the audience. We begin by thinking Mona Lisa will be about these two characters learning to appreciate each other, but it slowly develops into a frantic search for a long-lost friend from the hooker’s past.
I watched this and The Long Good Friday back-to-back, and I came away with a deeper appreciation for Bob Hoskins as an actor. In Good Friday, he’s a ruthless gangster who stares in vain as his empire crumbles before his eyes, and here is a more innocent, boorish character. He’s the lowest level in the British mob that one can be, fresh from a stint in jail and desperate for any job that will take him. It is here that Caine extends a helping hand, and arranges for him to become the driver to Cathy Tyson’s call girl. It’s not a surprise that Hoskins got an Oscar nomination for his role, but what is a shock is that it was his lone nomination before retiring in 2012.
For her part, Cathy Tyson is elusive and mysterious. Projecting a cultivated aura that is supposed to be enigmatic and alluring, Hoskins stands no chance once we learn that he is falling in love with this woman. She was performing a siren call to him from the very beginning. When we learn the truth about her, everything we’ve seen happen before takes on the appearance of a character performing to get a desired outcome. It’s a tricky character, and Tyson excels at it. This feels like a star is born role, but alas, Tyson only sporadically appeared in films after this.
And now we must end where we began, with that happy ending. After getting thrown into the deep end, the neat and tidy ending doesn’t work. Everything seemed to be leading to an ending of tremendous ambiguity and power. Instead, we’re given something that neatly ties everything together and then ties it all up with a bow on top. It stood out as a discordant tone to the rest of the film for me. And it is here that the film fails to deliver. It doesn’t stick the landing, and so points must be deducted.
