Ripley Under Ground (2005)

After his friend, a successful young artist, is killed in a car accident, Tom Ripley and his friends hide his body and concoct a scheme in which they forge his paintings, eventually making a great deal of money. When an art collector complains that a painting he bought from the gallery is a fake, Ripley must use his inimitable talents to defuse the problem by whatever means necessary. Ripley Under Ground was produced during July and August 2003, but it was not released until two years later. The film was shown on the 2005 AFI Fest by American Film Institute. The film received a low-profile wide theatrical release on 6 November 2005, as well as being shown at the AFI Fest film festival in Los Angeles. It was released on DVD on 24 July 2007 in the Netherlands.

Critical reviews have been scarce, owing to the smaller release. Variety’s review was less than positive, saying: “Although it strives to push Patricia Highsmith’s best-known bad man in a snarky direction, Ripley Under Ground is too fidgety and unsure to settle on a sustained tone and ends up in a no man’s land between hysterical satire and sleek Euro thriller.