AmericanPapist Comments
Ick. Unless I hear there's something worthwhile, I'll stick with the novel and the Jeremy Irons film version, thank you.
I would be more surprised had Hollywood made a faithful adaptation....even more shocking had they made changes but retained the essential themes. The themes of the novel don't exactly resonate with the modern zeitgeist, still less with Hollywood sensibilities.
I love that book. And the Jeremy Irons version of it, which captures the essence by being unwilling to tamper with any of the story.
What? Hollywood messed up a beautiful book? How shocking.
However, I am surprised that you don't mention Charles and Sebastian being gay and Catholicism being the Big Scary Anti-Gay Conspiracy, embodied in Lady Marchmain. Did they really miss such an obvious opportunity?
I am just now getting into the book for the first time for my Church's book club (we meet a week from this coming Monday at St. Matthew's Cathedral, if anyone is interested). I'm only 1/4 of the way through. but I can easily see how Hollywood could completely muss it up.
Conversely, to completely ignore the sensual elements, as some "purists" seem fond of doing, also does a great disservice to the novel. I've been a fan of the novel for quite some time (having re-read it probably a few too many times), and I'm excited simply because someone is re-thinking it! People interpret literature in many ways, and there's nothing wrong with that. Good literature WILL spark the imagination. (Case in point: that DiCaprio remake of "Romeo and Juliet"-- obviously not faithful to the original, but good just the same!)
DiCaprio' remake of R&J was respectable; this version of BR, oto, gives EVERY indication of being garbage. My visera shrivel at the promos. btw, being a Waugh purist, I have never avoided the sensual element of his works. That would be absurd. Those who do downplay it are prudes, and should not eat at the same table with gentlemen.
Looks like they are trying to turn it into the Talented Mr. Ripley. Blech!
So lame, I guess thats what we get when most people cant understand subtlety.
I'm still in the process of reading the book for the first time, its difficult, subtle, and wonderful, and clearly this movie is none of those things.
You've got to be kidding. They took one of the great novels of the last century and hammered it into cookie-cutter Hollywood film about sex and money. Evelyn Waugh had depth. This is shallow.
Ugh...
"Really, Emma Thompson should know better than to involve herself in such a travesty."
Maybe she doesn't read.
EmmaT is one of my all-time favorite actresses, but she has signed-on to some pretty rotten films. alas.
Everybody's read Romeo and Juliet, and the plot is therefore ripe for "retelling the fairytale", so to speak.
Beowulf? Not so much. Brideshead Revisited? Incredibly obscure to most people. So it's a bad idea to "retell" what hasn't really been told. (Although I'll grant you that there've been many more screen retellings of Brideshead than Beowulf.)
My kids enjoyed my reading aloud of Beowulf, but I couldn't allow them to watch the movie. The characters didn't seem very familiar - more of a re-rwrite than a re-tell.
It's no surprise that Hollywood takes 'artistic license' with anything it touches, whether it be well known works of literature, historical events, people's biographies, etc. It would have been a big surprise if this new version of BR stuck with the essential elements of the novel. Over time, I've grown wary of many film remakes of anything put out these days, I generally regard most of them as junk and don't bother watching them. If a film based on a book was already made in the past and it was successful, then I don't see how a new version can improve or enhance the story. Especially when today's films often go over the top on the sex and violence, it's become increasingly rare that a film adaptation of a famous book remains faithful to the author's original telling. And when it comes to Brideshead Revisited, the excellent cast of the PBS production is by now so memorable, I don't understand why anyone would want to do another film of it, it seems a waste of time and money.
The trailer, at least, looks like it is aimed at the Sex and the City demographic.
Waugh's novels aren't exactly public domain. It says something about the inheritors of his copyrights that they'd countenance such slop.
I'd be careful of slamming Hollywood all together. There is some good art out there.
I say that because I have seen two other of Andrew Davies's messes, both Jane Austen movies on PBS. One was Sense and Sensibilities, which lacked in writing and acting ability, and then his awful treatment of a Room With A View. What a mess it was.
No, It sounds like Davies lacks a sense of art and talent.
It is shocking to me how much some people believe that they can get from a TRAILER. Please, go and watch some trailers for your favorite movies and see whether you think that they correspond to the actual experience.
And I'll just copy here what I posted at Ignatius Insight:
Well this: "Fifth, the religious theme is hinted at only by a dropped crucifix" is plain wrong. There is a dropped ROSARY (noticeably lacking a crucifix) in the trailer and there is also a scene with Julia clearly making the sign of the cross in what is certainly hinted to be a Catholic Church ("a life he never imagined"). Not sure where they get the "incestuous relationship" from, except in that typical American Puritanism that sees sex in any physical contact or intimacy (such as the twins embracing at the beach.)
And of course Julia is in Venice, because if you are going to get any of your cast to Venice (as they have done) then you might as well get ALL of them there if possible, especially your romantic leads.
That being said, I have no doubt that they'll butcher the novel, but that's what 85% of movies based on books do, so we oughtn't be too surprised, ought we? Hopefully, it's also a good movie.
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