This is one of the few times a tagline suits the movie perfectly. "Sometimes the greatest journey is the distance between two people" is the basic setup for The Painted Veil, as Walter (Norton) and Kitty (Watts) go as far as Shang Hai, into the heart of a cholera epidemic as well as into the hearts of each other, to finally find a place for themselves.
I sneaked a peek at the book at Borders before the movie, and the first two pages immediately describe Kitty's affair and the silent and mysterious person who might have witnessed it. Unlike the book, the movie does not begin with the affair, but opens with the scene of a rainy afternoon in the middle of somewhere in China, with Walter and Kitty sitting on rocks with paper umbrellas, waiting. Perhaps for the start of their relationship of love, which never happened when they married.
They get picked up after what would seem to be a while, but probably an eternity to an exhausted Kitty, who is slick with pespiration. Walter's sardonic side is introduced here with his response, "Just on time". The flashbacks before this have already told us that he is punishing her, because he was the silent and mysterious person who witnessed his wife sleeping with another man. He had given her the option of joining him on his voluntary mission to some obscure village off Shang Hai to help with the cholera epidemic, or endure his outright divorce on the grounds of adultery. At Kitty's pleading for a more gentlemanly way of handling the matter, Walter gives her option C) He will let her divorce him silently, should her lover Charlie divorce his wife and marry Kitty. Kitty gives this option to Charlie, who predictably turns her down, and so we arrive at the obscure village, and are greeted by a death procession.
Walter had proposed to Kitty two days after he saw her at a party, to which he was invited by her father. He proposed without trumpets and not on bended knee, and (as we find out later in the movie) with full knowledge that should Kitty agree to it, she only did to get as far away as possible from her mother. He proposed, as he later confessed, knowing she was selfish and spoiled, but had hoped she would improve. He proposed, also because he loved her.
Kitty did not love him. And there is a beautiful scene where her lover, this is before he becomes her lover, spins a story to translate the action onstage in an opera house in Shang Hai. The opera singer is wiping her cheek, because she is sold into slavery, condemned to a life of drudgery and despair, the chains falling from her sleeves symbolize her entrapment and her loss of that freedom and vivacity she once possessed. Kitty empathizes, and falls for the story, as well as the man (though he confessed he had no clue what the opera singer was singing because he did not speak Chinese).
In that obscure village, Walter and Kitty take up residence in a dilapilated shack, where Kitty finds a doll on a bed. Walter kindly notifies her that the previous tenant probably died in bed, and that that was to be her room. Boy is he good at playing the devil.
The punishment carries on, as Walter meets his first cholera patient (since he never did before, being a 'bacterialogist') and many more, finds the source of the disease and closes off the water supply. Kitty is left to her own devices, and they are few - a fan just about sums up her possessions, until she meets Mother Superior, the head of the Catholic nuns, and gets inspired to volunteer. Given her musical inclinations, it is not surprising that Walter sees her at the piano playing with the children one fine day as he strolls down the corridor from the infirmatory. This is the first step of their bridging the distance, and leads to many more. Eventually, they have one wild night of passionate sex, moments after which follows the classic vomiting scene and lo and behold, Kitty is pregnant.
But alas, she is probably more than two months along and has no idea who the father is. Nevertheless, the ever-merciful Walter takes her into his arms and says, "It doesn't matter at this point."
Things carry on the way they do until the peace is shattered by the invasion of refugees from a village down south, where the epidemic has spread. Walter bravely takes up arms with the disease as he helps out in the refugee camp, and his noble work comes to a halt. Kitty is awoken one night and brought to the camp to ease his going, and that she does.
The reason I am narrating so much is that this is after all, a drama. And as dramas go, the story is of the essence. There are no explosions, no guns (except one fired at the sky), no blood (though there are excessive bodily fluids spilled), no sex; it's called lovemaking in a drama, but a emotional journey made by man and woman to come together at a point. The man, Norton, is sardonic and charming at the same time, while Watts delivers what I believe to be her best performance (I'm chancing this since I didn't catch King Kong, but I think it's a good bet) in her portrayal of a immature pretty lady who grows into the woman that her husband wanted her to be. She got me hating her selfish ways at the start, and won me over, toward the end, with her newfound commitment and selflessness.
The Painted Veil is well-acted, well-paced, well-framed, and a wholesome tear-jerker with very scenic backgrounds and a good cinematographer to bring it out. 7.5, Ladies, come and get it.
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