Every once in a while, a film comes along that actually reaffirms your initial misgivings, apprehensions, judgements, preconceived ideas and beliefs. See, with movies, there’s always that anticipation that comes with the whole movie-going adventure and a longing for, if not a profound and life-changing experience, at least a sustained sense of entertainment and escape from reality. But there are films that defy the escape. It’s not the actors, the director, the sets, costumes, music, lighting, or even the story. No, it’s none of that. It’s the characters. And that’s not to say that the script is poorly written. It’s the characters that come in contact with our being. The three films (yes; in the scores of movies I’ve seen, only three) that I so desperately wanted to change my view were My Week With Marilyn, Anna Karenina, and The Great Gatsby.
My Week With Marilyn
I’m one of the few that is not a fan of Marilyn Monroe. I understand that she was not just a sex symbol, but a symbol of desire and that she is one of a select breed that can harness that external desire and have others conform to her wants. I have studied pictures of her and a couple of her films, but honestly feel she was an over-sexed and wholly synthetic woman that didn’t have much to recommend her but her looks. Her success, in my eyes, was seeing that the world saw beauty in the false. She was, I won’t deny, other-worldly and certainly not normal. I can certainly understand why she was a magnet for attention; wanted and unwanted, male and female, on-screen and off. However, I could not reconcile all the oft-scribled quotes and Halloween costumes to a woman who, despite coming from a hard and disastrous childhood, refused to break out of being a bombshell, the bombshell. And after seeing My Week With Marilyn, I still can’t. Right before seeing the film, I thought, “Please, let this change my mind. Let me see what every one else sees.” I wanted to fall in love with this siren. The acting was magnificent. Michelle Williams captured the essence of Marilyn Monroe and was her in both body and spirit. And yet, with every move and sentence that were quintessentially Marilyn, I thought, “There. That, right there, is why I don’t like this woman.” She was a weepy little girl who could turn men on with a simple look but couldn’t turn any one on with self-worth. Instead of establishing who she was as a person, she sunk deeper and deeper into a weird starvation for others’ honest approval of who she actually was. And this is by no means a harsh criticism of the fantastic work done by Ms. Williams; she sincerely conveyed the humanness and insecurities that every one, including those in the limelight, shares. But there was nothing in the story of who Marilyn Monroe was that showed me that she was some one that should be praised other than for her supposed beauty.
Anna Karenina
Upon finishing the novel by Tolstoy, I felt a bit of anger. Here was this woman who, in all selfishness, could not satisfy herself with the marital love of her husband, nor the pure love of Count Vronsky or the unadulterated love of her son. She, who had so severely damaged the lives of others felt sorry for herself. The text was well-written, it is a fantastic story. But this woman, hailed the world over as a tragic heroine, was unfathomably narcissistic and I could not align her actions with logic, common sense, or even being human. I knew, going into the movie, that I would like it. With Joe Wright behind the camera, Keira Knightly in front of it, and the words of Tolstoy translated by the talented Tom Stoppard, I was so excited for how deliciously cinematic it would be. Right before seeing the film, I thought, “Please, let this change my mind. Let me see what every one else sees.” Let me fall in love with this tragic woman. Once again, my mind went unchanged. The film was beautiful (of course it was, it’s Joe Wright). And while I was envious of the passionate and pure love shared between Anna and Vronsky (please don’t assume that just because I felt a twinge of envy, I actually approve of adultery), I still rolled my eyes when the train came rolled through and thought, “What a little bitch.” Harsh and quite un-lady-like, sure, but a visceral and all too familiar reaction to witnessing a lack of sense. My apparent inability to comprehend how the tragedy in being selfish is something to be recognized as great remains constant and I undoubtedly continue to have an extreme dislike for this tortured protagonist.
The Great Gatsby
Now, by no means am I an F. Scott Fitzgerald expert. But I am an avid reader of his works and have read beyond the high-school prerequisite of his most famous novel. And personally, The Great Gatsby is not my favorite (I leave that to Tender is the Night). The tale of decadence and foolishness just never settled well with me and I much prefer the honesty of his other novels. That’s not to say that it isn’t a fantastic and extremely well-executed story. To me, the optimism and idealism of Jay Gatsby juxtaposed with the cynicism and self-absorbed nature of the Buchanans has never registered as truthful, but I understand that it’s a hyperbole of the human condition and the American Dream. However, I have never fully understood why every one praises The Great Gatsby over his other novels. Right before seeing the film, I thought, “Please, let this change my mind. Let me see what every one else sees.” And this film, unlike the other two, didn’t necessarily reaffirm my original feelings but, more than that, actually originated my dislike for all the characters, save Gatsby. It must be the preconceived notion I have that protagonists, while faulty, have something inherently good in them that makes them likable. The film spoke the truth of Nick Carraway’s narrative and I believe the film was true to the essence of the novel and Baz Lurhman has once again created a fun, whimsical and dreamy portrayal of another time that remains relevant. However, I couldn’t get on board with a story that ends in cowardice and the destruction of idealism.
Of course, all this commentary is colored by my personal desires and views of how the world ought to be, how it is, and how it should be portrayed in the escapist art of cinema and literature. I absolutely loved these three films. At the core of all of them, they are the best adaptations of these stories and are a credit to the world of imagination, artistic license, and the truth of these accounts, both fiction and not. They are accurate to my perceptions. It’s the stories that are indeed accurate that make us ask questions of our perceptions. And I sincerely wish that my perceptions would allow me to experience being on the side of the majority of the lauded.
Commentaires