In spite Anne Bancroft’s Oscar® nom & Best Actress @ Cannes, this British New Wave classic is little remembered. Much the same could be said for its unlucky director Jack Clayton with a mere seven features over 25 years; all superb except for the only one that seems to count, his inert GREAT GATSBY from '74. This one may not be the best place to start though; a tough, nasty, often bitterly funny intellectual marital bruiser, but it sure is tasty! With Harold Pinter (no less) adapting Penelope Mortimer’s novel about a mentally unstable wife raising a passel of kids from three husbands. Her latest, steady, emotionally reserved novelist & screenwriter Peter Finch, may or may not be unfaithful, especially when on location. Or so says James Mason, wryly considering his status as cuckold of the moment, and out to let Bancroft know the score. But plot movement only touches at the heart of things here, where attitude & style, rotten to the core under a cloak of civility, is Clayton’s real target. And while it doesn’t hit consistently, overstating here & there, plenty gets thru, and the film only improves as it goes along. (Plus a delicious early credit for Maggie Smith, stealing all her scenes from Bancroft. No easy thing to do!)
SCREWY THOUGHT OF THE DAY: The film often feels like a strange cross between LOLITA/’62 and TWO FOR THE ROAD/’67. The latter mirrored in marital spats and the can’t-live-with-him/can’t-live-without-him situation. But why LOLITA should come to mind is a little tricky. Perhaps it’s just James Mason, and the shared b&w look from cinematographer Oswald Morris who shot them both.
DOUBLE-BILL: Just about any of Clayton’s features will be a revelation if you only know him from GATSBY. And while his best may be THE INNOCENTS/’61, from James’s TURN OF THE SCREW, scripted by John (husband of Penelope) Mortimer, don’t ignore his remarkably beautiful, downright terrifying, SOMETHING WICKED THIS WAY COMES/’83, from the Ray Bradbury book via, of all studios, Disney.
No comments:
Post a Comment