TV REVIEW : ‘Isle’: A Compelling Tale of Self-Discovery

“Grand Isle,” the story of a woman’s sensual and emotional awakening, is so quietly compelling and richly textured that it deserves a life after television on the big screen.

As a TV movie, “Grand Isle” is a rarity, shimmering in a space all its own. A pet project of producer and star Kelly McGillis, the production is also a measure of cable’s barely tested horizons, a startlingly mature movie for TV that must have been risky for even Ted Turner (on whose TNT it premieres today at 5 p.m., 7 p.m. and 9 p.m.).

With a cast and crew mostly of women, “Grand Isle” is the largely interior drama of a wife’s self-discovery--basic in plot but ripe like a plum--that probably could not have been written and directed by men at all. Its woman’s view of sensuality, augmented by its sultry, turn-of-the-century Louisiana setting, is adapted from Kate Chopin’s 1889 novel, “The Awakening,” an early vision of emancipation so brutally received it was banned for years.

A novel ahead of its time waiting to be filmed, it’s been impressively adapted by Hesper Anderson and evocatively directed by Mary Lambert (in a remarkable leap from directing “Pet Sematary” and music videos for Janet Jackson and Madonna).

Lambert’s soothing but coiled direction, enhanced by the languorous, tropical Gulf imagery of cinematographer Toyomichi Kurita, captures a lazy, stuffy, privileged world of rich Creole gentlemen, happily suppressed wives and black maids holding up parasols for pampered children running around the beach in white cottons.

The ensnared heroine, Edna Pontellier (McGillis), awakens from her emotional slumber at beautiful Grand Isle, a Louisiana summer resort where she shocks herself by falling in love with an ardent young man (Adrian Pasdar) who teaches her how to swim (the story’s central awakening metaphor).

She loses him, returns to New Orleans with her blustery husband (Jon DeVries) and indulges her unspoken longings with a society rake (Julian Sands), whom she dallies with like a chocolate eclair. She trains herself to be a sketch artist and, just like her contemporary Nora in “A Doll’s House,” finds that choice is hers and dumps her husband and children.

All this is told in a tone alien to most TV viewers. There’s little overt conflict, nobody is really an adversary, and the style, punctuated by bright white fade-outs and the heroine’s childhood dreams, is gossamer-tinged.

McGillis, under a tiara of red hair, is luminous as the serene basket case, her eyes reflecting her flux, her simmering feelings and her growing confidence. A bonus is the presence of Ellen Burstyn as an eccentric Bohemian grand dame and spiritual soul-mate who plays Chopin’s “Nocturne in E Minor” as our heroine buries her head in dark, velvet pillows.

Suddenly, who should show up at the door but that feverish young man from Grand Isle who taught Mrs. Pontellier to navigate deep waters. The unexpected ending--too poetic for words--will leave many viewers ravished.

Here’s a woman’s story (co-produced by Carolyn Pfeiffer) that transcends gender, age and even the last century.