Most of all, he draws stellar performances out of his outstanding cast. DiCaprio and Winslet prove that they still have a magnetic on-screen chemistry, although this time it is clearly much more abrasive. Much of the awards attention seems to be going to Winslet (also starring in The Reader this season), who in some ways is playing an extension of her liberated spirit in Titanic within 1950s suburban environs. But I hope some attention is also paid to DiCaprio because he is the one who really shows dimensions we have never seen from him before. April accurately observes his character as “a pathetic, self-deluded little boy” right at the start and it is astonishing to see how the typical boyish qualities he is most often associated with are skewered into the perpetual confusion and irremediable hopelessness implied by the description from Winslet’s character.
With that sense of repeated abrasion and hopelessness, we know that Revolutionary Road will not even offer the slight glimmer of hope American Beauty offered at the end. That may drive many fans of DiCaprio and Winslet away from this film, particularly the younger ones who have fond memories of them from Titanic. But it should not for this reason: they can find an object lesson that a love and marriage founded only on the whims of an idealized romance can come crashing down like a house of cards later in life.
Bottom line: Pretty close to brilliance.
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