'Great Expectations' (1989), part 1

(A while back, just after Jean Simmons died, I promised to review the version of Great Expectations in which she played Miss Havisham. The miniseries comes in a three-video set. This part of the review covers the first video.)

You know, when you think about it, it's not so surprising that someone might think of Great Expectations as a sort of horror story. The opening in the foggy graveyard, the cruelties and terrors inflicted on young Pip, the poisonous atmosphere of Satis House -- it all combines to strike a pretty disturbing note. 

This 1989 version -- a Disney version, no less! -- plays up that aspect pretty effectively. Thus, we open with little Pip cowering in a particularly gloomy and frightening graveyard, when out of the mist comes HANNIBAL LECTER! AIIEEEEEE!!

Well, no, it's Magwitch. But it's Magwitch played by Anthony Hopkins. You can see where the creepy vibe comes in. (Not that he was then known for Silence of the Lambs, but watching him now, it's hard to avoid the implications.)

Things are no better at home, where Pip's sister (Rosemary McHale) is one scary woman. When she doses Pip and Joe, and they're choking and sputtering, she laughs at them. Seriously. She just stands there laughing and laughing like it's the funniest thing she's ever seen. If I were Pip, I'd rather be out on the marshes with Hannibal Magwitch.

But at least he has Gimli to comfort him! John Rhys-Davies makes an especially warm and sympathetic Joe. He's one of the best parts of the whole production -- there were moments when I just wanted to hug him, especially when he was grieving over his wife after her injury. To see Joe so genuinely sad over a woman who had treated him like dirt was oddly but deeply moving.

On the whole, I'm very happy with the adapting thus far -- they manage to follow the book faithfully and thoroughly while making what adjustments are necessary for the medium. They even have Trabb's boy! However, I'm finding the casting a little uneven. Young Pip (Martin Harvey) is very good, and older Pip (Anthony Calf) is fine so far. Biddy (Susan Franklyn) is fine as well, although she and Pip have a bit of an Anakin/Padme thing going on (he ages, she never seems to). But Orlick (Niven Boyd) is slight and scrappy instead of hulking and menacing, which doesn't work for me at all.

And then there's Estella. At first I thought Kim Thomson was going to be excellent -- and she is . . . . sort of. She has exactly the right look, exactly the right attitude, exactly the right mannerisms -- and yet something's missing.

I think that Estella, underneath all her pride and spitefulness, has to have something enchanting about her, something that makes the dazed orphan boy fall helplessly under her spell. Something that goes beyond beauty. I can feel it in the book, even when she's at her very nastiest. Jean Simmons had it when she played young Estella. Thomson, for all her talent, doesn't have it. And without it, Estella is nothing but a sadistic bully. Instead of crying over her after he leaves that first day, you expect Pip to run like mad and thank God for his escape from the nuthouse.

(I did, however, notice for the first time the number of similarities between Estella and Pip's sister!)

Also, Estella doesn't age either, being played by the same actress all the way through. All this has the unfortunate effect of making poor Pip look like some kind of rapidly growing mutant.

But speaking of Simmons . . . ! She is magnificent as Miss Havisham. She completely subsumes that vibrant personality of hers into the role of the bitter, vindictive old woman, to the point where I hardly would have recognized her. And apparently everyone onset found her an inspiration, because the director and the artistic director and everyone else seem to go all out in her scenes. The lighting and camera angles and sets are all artfully managed to add to her air of mystery and gloom, and again give the film a bit of that Gothic horror feel.

With the exception of the wedding cake. Despite the rats running in and out of it, it looks less like a great heap of ruin and more like a rat-themed cake that the Cake Boss might have delivered the day before yesterday. However, the rest of the place looks satisfyingly ancient and eerie.

But even with all that support, it's Simmons who does the lion's share of the work. Every little detail of her performance is spot on. When she rises up slightly in her chair in a scene with older Pip, it's with a movement like a snake uncoiling. She is, quite simply, breathtaking, and I can't wait to see more of her.

Life is exceptionally hectic just now, but I'm hoping to be able to watch and review part two sometime in the next week. No promises, though. I'm just not very good at keeping them.

Comments

[David Perdue]

This is my favorite version of GE. I loved Hopkins as Magwitch and John Rhys-Davies as Joe Gargery.

[Nina]

Hmm, very interesting. I wonder what Disney was doing making a GE adaptation, though, and a faithful one? What, did they show it on the Disney Channel? It just doesn't seem like their thing....

[Gina]

Good question, Nina. I did a little research, and yes, it did air on the Disney Channel.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1P2-3951356.html

And while I was searching, I also found this: a ten-minute YouTube clip from the film! It lets you see Simmons and Rhys-Davies and several of the other main actors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1-CMmAocww

[Gina]

(Oh, and if you like, you can compare Estellas:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wNPou58Lvg&feature=related )

[Selenia]

Wow! This version sounds good - especially the parts with Miss Havisham! I wish I could get ahold of it :).

[Christy]

I actually never think of Hannibal Lecter when I think of Anthony Hopkins, since I don't think I've even seen previews for those movies (thank goodness). I think of him as Zorro and C.S. Lewis and the chap in Howard's End. He's a lovely actor.
This sounds like a neat version.

[Gina]

He is indeed. I loved him in "Shadowlands" and "The Lion in Winter" and so on. But "out of the mist comes RICHARD THE LIONHEART!" didn't sound scary enough. :-)

[Christy]

Hahaha.

[Patti]

I saw this as a mini-series on TV, and have never forgotten it. Jean Simmons and John Rhys-Davies are the two actors who've stuck in my mind and make me want to own DVDs of this version. And I remember thinking at the time, "Disney's put good money into this and made it look splendid--e.g. a fine team of horses pulling a carriage--but they've kept their fingers out of the pie. This is still the story that Dickens wrote."

[Don]

I had the Laser Disc set, but sadly lost it when I moved. I hate thinking about that loss. Wonderful adaptation. Why they haven't put it on DVD is beyond me.

[Cody]

I wish they would release it again too. If only there were someone to petition