TWGGAWI™

Ripley and the enduring story of
the white guy getting away with it.

Ripley, Steve Zaillian’s 2024 adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s novel The Talented Mr Ripley, is undeniably gorgeous. The limited series on Netflix is visually sumptuous, exquisitely shot in black and white, on location across Italy. Predictably, reviews in major American media in fields of everything from home decorating (House Beautiful) to luxury lifestyle (Town & Country) and travel (Conde Nast Traveler) gushed over the setting, and, in copy that was surely enhanced (written?) by the series’ marketing department, took pains to reassure readers that they, too, could experience Italy’s delights firsthand, naming the cities and villages and pointing out which of the character’s homes were bookable on Airbnb.

The series’ visual seduction, its setting of an otherworldly Italy, is supposed to enhance the way we identify with the anti-hero Tom Ripley (played by Andrew Scott). You’re meant to root for him, because who wouldn’t want to walk into a beautiful affluent life in beautiful Italy? Tom Ripley, from a modest background (which varies across the novel and the three screen adaptations), stumbles into an assignment to go to Italy and persuade Dickie Greenleaf, scion of an exceedingly wealthy shipping family, to return to New York. Dickie’s father is footing the bill. But Tom ends up murdering Dickie and assuming his identity — maybe even living Dickie’s life better than Dickie could have. We are supposed to find our moral compass recalibrating watching Tom evade detection, supposed to want to see him succeed in his grisly objective. In the novel, he does. Looking over his shoulder, perhaps, but acquiring Dickie’s loot.