To the casual acquaintance, Tom Ripley (Matt Damon) is a bland, bespectacled American with no discernible skills or personality. But Ripley is a monster with a destructive anxiety to belong and self-described "cellars" in his mind to which he has thrown away the key. He does, however, have three talents: forging signatures, telling lies and impersonating almost anyone with uncanny accuracy. Bluffing his way into a New York cocktail party held by millionaire Greenleaf (an excellent performance by James Rebhorn), Tom finds himself engaged to bring back the rich man's wayward son Dickie (Jude Law) from Italy. Posing as Dickie on the way out when running into an heiress (Cate Blanchett), Ripley is soon soaking up Dickie and his jazz-oriented lifestyle in which he has schooled himself to take an interest. Dickie's fiancée (Gwyneth Paltrow) isn't so sure about Tom and of course she's right: this will end in tears and a number of murders. Ripley seems to be left in a hole at the end but, since he has wriggled his way out of several others like a snake, there's no reason to suppose he won't escape again. All this is fascinating for about two-thirds of an overlong running time but it tends to meander after the second death and lose impetus.