Film Review

09 January 2009 13:10 BST

Brideshead Revisited

Directed by Julian Jarrold, out October 3rd in cinemas, starring Matthew Goode, Ben Whishaw, Hayley Atwell, Emma Thompson, Michael Gambon, running time 133 mins.

In a nutshell...

Decadent and droll but lacking in depth.

What's it all about?

Captain Charles Ryder (Goode), stationed at Brideshead estate during the second world war, reminiscences on his entanglements with the owners of the mansion. Having been befriended by the flamboyant Sebastian Flyte (Whishaw) while at Oxford, Charles is quickly seduced by the trappings of aristocratic life and over one hedonistic summer finds his affections swayed by Sebastian's beautiful younger sister Julia (Atwell). But as Charles' attachment to the Marchmain family grows, the strength of their Catholic faith puts head and heart at odds.


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Who's in it?

Webber Douglas Academy graduate Matthew Goode has worked alongside Mandy Moore, Scarlett Johansson and Ed Harris and will soon have the glare of fanboys the world over on him as he takes the role of Ozymandias in Zack Snyder's Watchmen adaptation.

To read the inthenews.co.uk interview with Matthew Goode, click here

Repeatedly dubbed the best actor of his generation, Ben Whishaw, 27, trained at Rada and has pulled in Olivier award, European film awards and Bafta nominations for his consistently intense and layered performances and beat off the challenge of Leonardo Di Caprio and Orlando Bloom to win the coveted role of Jean-Baptiste Grenouille in Perfume: The Story of a Murderer.

Hayley Atwell made her film debut in Woody Allen's Cassandra's Dream in 2007 and has recently been seen in The Duchess and the ITV adaptation of Mansfield Park.

Finally, director Julian Jarrold made his feature debut with 2005 comedy Kinky Boots, after an acclaimed television career, the highlights of which include Cracker and White Teeth.

As an example...

"Sodomites. All of them. Steer well clear." - Charles is warned about Sebastian and friends by his cousin Jasper

"She died working for the Red Cross. Which given her devotion to God rather points out the arbitrariness of it all." - Charles on his mother

"It's different in Italy. Not so much guilt. We do what the heart tells us and then we go on to confession." - Cara on Catholicism

Likelihood of a trip to the Oscars

It will almost certainly have been produced with this in mind and while Jeremy Brock and Andrew Davies' script is suitably witty and Jarrold's photography sumptuous throughout, there's little that lifts this production from the realm of excellent television dramas - where it would certainly have scooped awards - into the arena of period drama box office success a la Atonement and the like.

What the others say

"Allowing audiences sufficient retro-aristo-lifestyle sumptuousness for their dollar, yet exhibiting admirable, intelligent directorial restraint, this Brideshead is mainstream arthouse fare par excellence." - Dennis Harvey, Variety

"[A] lazy, complacent film, which takes the novel's name in vain." - AO Scott, New York Times

So is it any good?

Goode quite aptly eluded to "the elephant in the room" of the television series at the pre-release press conference and as accomplished an adaptation as this is, it can't help but be compared - and unfavourably at that - to the peerless Granada version.

That said, there's much to credit cast and crew for, with the initial Oxford and Brideshead summer scenes bathed in a soporific glow while Whishaw and Thompson especially make much of the sardonic screenplay.

Performances leave little to criticise with Michael Gambon his usual mischievous self, Thompson a force of nature as a smiling, terrifying embodiment of piety and Whishaw as astonishing as ever, with so much suggested within his eyes, and anger and resentment always looming unseen beneath Sebastian's flighty passion.

Goode carries himself with an elegance that will allay the fears of any Watchmen fans but as his grace makes him less devilish than Jeremy Irons, the material intent that steadily grows within Charles seems less plausible. Atwell, meanwhile is undeniably beautiful but the screen does not fizz between her and Goode as it does between the latter and Whishaw and only exacerbates the pitfalls inevitable in squeezing the novel into 130 minutes.

Relationships feel forced and while we're certainly convinced by the Charles-Sebastian love angle, Julia is such an unsympathetic, two-dimensional character that in falling for her, Charles seems to be failing through gratifying his own lust, rather than the love we're supposed to - but do not - believe in.

Intensifying both the love triangle elements and the overpowering Catholic themes of Waugh's novel certainly gives the piece the necessary dramatic tension to last the duration and if only we'd been given more time with the characters would we feel more moved by their eventual fates.

As it stands, this is a beautifully layered, intense exploration of love and faith that might be too ponderous for modern audiences and doesn't elicit the emotional reaction for which it is aiming.

7/10

Lewis Bazley

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