Free | CinemaNow
Posted: 5/27/2012
Based on Mordecai Richler's award winning novel--his last and, arguably, best ? BARNEY'S VERSION is the warm, wise and witty story of the politically incorrect life of Barney Panofsky (Paul Giamatti), who meets the love of his life (Rosamund Pike) at his wedding - and she is not the bride. A candid confessional, told from Barney's point of view, the film spans three decades and two continents, taking us through the different 'acts' of his unusual history. The reason that Barney must tell his story now ? or, at least his version of it ? is that his sworn enemy has just published a tell-all book that dredges up the more compromising chapters of Barney's past: the many, often murky entrepreneurial schemes that lead to his success; the three marriages, all of them terminated; and, most problematically, the mysterious, as-yet-unsolved disappearance of Barney's best friend, Boogie, a possible murder for which Barney remains the prime suspect. Since his memory sometimes fails him, and because he has the unfortunate habit of getting blind drunk at pivotal moments, Barney leads us on this somewhat unsteady walk down memory lane, not only to explain his life to others, but also to explain it to himself.
Mostly, we learn about Barney by witnessing his three marriages, each representing, like the rings of a circus, different ?acts? of his life. There is his first wife, Clara (Rachelle Lefevre), a flame-haired, flagrantly unfaithful free spirit with whom Barney briefly lives la vie de Boheme in Rome. Then, after returning home to Montreal, Barney marries the 'Second Mrs. P.,' (Minnie Driver), a wealthy Jewish Princess who shops and talks incessantly, barely noticing that Barney is not listening. It is at their lavish wedding that Barney meets, and starts pursuing, Miriam (Rosamund Pike), the woman who will become his third wife, the mother of his two children, and the love of his life. Throughout their life together Barney is believed