Great Expectations

Bea says:  Cecil, being a little older than me, sometimes takes me along to the Seniors Screen at our local Odeon, when I have a Monday free.  A bargain at £3, with tea and biscuits thrown in.  Last Monday was Great Expectations.

Now, there has recently been a BBC TV production of Great Expectations, and at times during the first half this felt very similar indeed, although as the plot moved along, different episodes in Pip's life were focussed on, so it was in the end different enough - just.  It did make Cecil and I wonder though - Dickens had a pretty good output, why aren't we seeing any of his other works in film?  Like the Pickwick Papers, or A Tale of Two Cities, perhaps? 

So this is Dickens, so the story speaks for itself, and the larger than life characters jump off the screen.  Helena Bonham-Carter does a standout turn as Miss Haversham - but I have always liked her work and it is great to see her regularly back on the big screen - and Ralph Fiennes was almost unrecognisable as Magwitch.  I am afraid I didn't really rate the younger actors although I guess they have time to develop. 

And the rest - atmospheric locations (Kent in particular - although it seemed to be exactly the same location as the BBC television drama), nice costumes, but too much make up on Estella to be truly authentic and in fact it distracted me from what she was saying.

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Cecil says: As Bea says, it's difficult when two productions come out so soon after each other based on the same literary work. You're almost forced to compare, and although I liked Fiennes as Magwitch, I actually found Ray Winston scarier and therefore more true to my memories from reading the book.

As to Miss Haversham, I liked both Bonham-Carter and Gillian Anderson, so wouldn't try to compare or put them in a league table of favourites. But isn't it interesting - as Bea suggests - that I actually can't remember who played any of the other characters in either the TV production or the film we just saw.

The film did begin with virtually the same marshy set as the TV version. And there was lots of mud on camera, both in swampy Kent and in downtown Victorian London. They did pretty well, for that sense of just how grimey things were, even for the gentleman around town.

But even if they were trying to highlight the mud, there were a few too many shots taken at ankle level for my liking in this film. And a few too many very dark scenes, though again that is probably an attempt to make it more real for us softies living in the 21st century.

Apart from that, I did enjoy this, as did the rest of the 75-80 seniors who were in the audience: a fantastic turn-out for a Monday morning and maybe a lesson other cinemas should learn in terms of scheduling and pricing.

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