Giles Foster

Substance: One of those movies that can be enjoyed if you already have read the book, but are too elliptical if you have not, because they are missing a lot of the internal ruminations that explain behavior. However, the brevity does make the protagonist's choices very clear, almost starkly simple.
Characters are unbelievably uninterested in even the most elementary conversation, after being dropped into situations that demand explanation or at least interaction.
Edith's relationship with her show more lover is murky to say the least. Presumably they have some episodes of passion or understanding to explain her devotion to him and his indifference to her.
Forty minutes into the movie, we still don't know what 'sin' Edith committed to be 'banished' (by whom?) to the Hotel.
Beats around the bush, but basically the question is: should you strive for happiness or just contentment? Edith has neither, apparently - perhaps because she is looking in a dark alley for the coin lost elsewhere.

SPOILER ALERT (as if it made any difference):
Edith claims to want a consistent 'homey' relationship; she jilts the man who offers one, turns down another when she finds he is just as amoral as he said he was; returns to the 'love of her life' even though she sees him 0-2 times a month.

CONCLUSION: Good people doing good things are usually very happy; bad people doing bad things are usually satisfied; good people doing bad things are seldom content or happy. (Bad people doing good things repeatedly become good people).

STYLE:: The scenery is lovely, the hotel milieu convincing, and the music pleasant. The pace is deliberately slow, in the eighties romantic style: heavy on scenery and soul-ful looks, low on dialogue and action. This is what happens when you film literachur. The fllashbacks are annoying (and double-backs even more so), especially when the people and settings are not radically differentiated from the 'current' time-line.

To the film's credit, they follow the British convention of suiting the actors to the role: Anna Massey is not beautiful, and is dressed down for the part. Character roles are superb caricatures of the upper-class stereotypes.

Bon Mots: 'Good women always believe an offense is their fault; bad women never do.' show less

Jane Austen is one of my favorite authors. And I do love her novel Northanger Abbey, one of her earliest completed novels. I just don't like this adaptation. And that's not because I sneer at them. I adore the Colin Firth Pride and Prejudice, the Emma Thompson Sense and Sensibility and the Gweneth Paltrow Emma. This adaptation I couldn't even make myself watch to the end.

Mind you, later I would come across an adaptation of Northanger Abbey I loved the 2007 production directed by Jon Jones show more with Geraldine James and Michael Judd in lead roles. Notably, the screenplay was by Andrew Davies, who did the Colin Firth Pride and Prejudice. So there is a Northanger Abbey out there to love--I'd just avoid this one directed by Giles Foster. show less

An ITV production....forty years ago that would have meant high quality, but nowadays it doesn't. This one hour 40 minutes high speed tour through the life and times of George VI and his wife Elizabeth from meeting until his death is compromised by its short length, a high speed tour through highlights rather than anything in-depth.

The settings and costumes are fine, and so are some of the performances, especially as Juliet Aubrey as Elizabeth, someone any man could fall for. But Alan show more Bates' George V descends rapidly into caricature, and Charles Edwards makes an Edward VIII who has all the self-absorption but little of the charm. There are some strange characterisations amongst the supprting cast as well, with assistant private secretary Tommy Lascelles shown as a fat wise old duffer.

Overall this is inadequate stuff. show less

Not wholly satisfactory version but as there are only two adaptations, it is worth seeing this one. There are some odd directorial choices. Katherine Schlesinger is well enough as a gauche Catherine, but Peter Firth is too pompous as Henry Tilney.