Nor a thorn nor a threat...

Thoughts on period, performance, and
The House of Mirth

by
Chris Dashiell

The social masks, those carefully regulated rules of appearance that determine how people act in public, have always been a fertile subject for novelists. In the nineteenth century this aspect of life became, in its sheer complexity, almost an art form - and it is in the nineteenth century novel, therefore, that its portrayal reached a peak. Since then, the world of social intercourse has changed its form considerably, but it would be a mistake to think that the essential element, the mask, has disappeared. On the contrary, it is more powerful than ever. Only the forms have become less stylized and more integrated, so that if we judge by the evidence of popular film and fiction, it seems as if there is no one under the mask at all, and nothing other than superficial social interaction consciously exists. This at least is how I attempt to explain why artists of distinction, such as the English director Terence Davies, return to the world of the nineteenth century novel. These works clarify our dilemma by displaying the contrasts - between the world of convention and the authentic self with its feelings and desires - more clearly and more dramatically than we seem able to today.

Davies has made Edith Wharton's great novel The House of Mirth into a film, and he has adopted an unusual approach in doing so. Rather than using the material as a vehicle for his own concerns, or creating "entertainment" through the distancing effect of dramatic spectacle, Davies has directed all of his style and method towards faithfully translating the sensibility of the book itself. That The House of Mirth succeeds wonderfully is due, then, as much to Wharton herself as to her interpreter. It also means, however, that the film refuses to hold our hand and explain everything in a way that will guarantee we not be involved or implicated in its truth. And since the public has become addicted to being led by the nose, like donkeys, and always to the same complacently reassuring ends, this approach ensures that the film has only found an audience willing to take the trouble to look for it.

Lily Bart (Gillian Anderson), an orphan taken under the wing of her rich aunt (Eleanor Bron), has made a sparkling entrance into the wealthy New York society of 1905. She is, unfortunately, not very well schooled in the rules of upper class behavior. She is expected, as a necessary part of fitting in with this circle, to play bridge with them at their big parties in the city or on their Long Island estates - but she loses more money than she can afford to at these games. This is an innocent mistake, and certainly not a serious one, since she can confidently expect a huge inheritance from her aunt. But her position is complicated by the fact that she is in her late twenties and still unmarried - unusual at that time - so it is therefore essential that she find a suitable husband, preferably a rich one. The trouble is, Lily - despite a streak of selfish carelessness - has a fineness of spirit, a conscience, and a need for real love, all of which conflict with the mercenary role she is expected to play.

All these plot niceties, which I have so neatly summed up for you, are not spelled out by Davies at all. We need to gather them ourselves, from the conversations and events at the beginning of the film. Because of this, some have complained that the film is confusing at first. Well, I don't doubt that it would be easier for a viewer to have read the book first. But I also don't think it's essential to understanding the movie, unless one is unwilling to try to use one's head at all while watching. Without a voice-over narrator, or a longer film, I really don't see how Davies could have done this differently. And in fact, the method is part of the message. It is just as much the task of Lily herself to define who is who, and what is really going on, as it is ours - so that we share her tentativeness, her perilous uncertainty, as she navigates the social labyrinth.

Gillian Anderson plays Lily. It is a performance of great bravery, first showing us the character's elaborate mask, and then gradually letting the mask fall, until we finally witness an intense vulnerability and sorrow that is heartrending. For an actress to display such range and depth, in only her third major part in a feature, and in a part of such difficulty, is remarkable. Depending on which social role Lily is attempting to play with which person, Anderson takes on various shadings of character that are moving, surprising, always convincing. The power of repression is almost palpable in her gestures and intonations. When fire breaks loose - as in a great confrontation scene with Anthony LaPaglia, as the social climber Rosedale - it does so with a rare force. Wharton's subject is a heart that, against all intention, will not submit to the falsity of an assigned role. Anderson reveals her heart as starkly as any performer in recent memory, and at the same time pulls off the difficult feat of showing us the internal forces that are always trying to prevent this revelation. If she continues to hone her craft, as I expect she will, we will witness the emergence of a great actress.

Davies' idiosyncratic casting is mostly successful. Eric Stoltz, an actor I don't normally associate with the idea of civilized refinement, plays Lawrence Selden, the lawyer and confirmed bachelor who has the only true affection and affinity for Lily. Although he associates with the wealthy, he is not wealthy himself, and this apparently excludes him from consideration as a husband for her. Their elaborate dance of courtship, which cannot call itself by that name, is the film's central motif. Stoltz plays Selden with a light tenderness and charm that only partly conceals an essential diffidence. The tragedy is that the forms of communication Selden and Lily are constrained to use with each other prevent them from ever fully expressing their true feelings. The bitter irony of Selden's story, which I think Stoltz conveys perfectly, is that he assumes a superior air towards the prevailing ethos of wealth and the idea of marrying money, while in fact his assumptions, and his lack of decision, are determined far more by this ethos than those of the seemingly less principled Lily.

Laura Linney is superb as the unscrupulous Bertha Dorset, whose treachery is concealed behind a bright smile. As a portrait in evil, I find Linney's cheerful self-confidence and matter-of-fact sense of ease to be more real, and more frightening, than a dozen Hollywood serial killers rolled up into one. Dan Ayckroyd plays Gus Trenor, a pompous businessman who compromises Lily by providing her with "assistance" that has dangerous strings attached. I've never been impressed with him as an actor, but I can find no fault with his work here. What distracting effect there might be is due to an identification with his television comedy work - and he certainly can't help that.

Davies treats the scenes as discrete glimpses into the story's fictional world, much like the tableau vivant in which Lily participates at the Trenor's party, rather than as the usual narrative progression. This is a deliberate technique, designed to focus attention on the inner fluctuation of character within a scene. It is a very penetrating narrative strategy, especially as seen in Gillian Anderson's expressions - in the progressively different accents of her scenes with Stoltz, or in the sudden realizations we see in her face as Lily connects events in a previous scene with what is occurring now. The camera placement and movement, the quality of the photography itself (Remi Adefarsin, whose credits include Elizabeth), and the production design (Don Taylor, who manages to make Glasgow look like 1905 New York), are all first-rate. There is a transition sequence which carries us from New York to Monte Carlo with a gradual pan through a rainstorm and into the image of flowing water, which, in its evocation of emotional travail through sheer imagery, comes close to genius. My one quibble is that the introduction, in the film's latter third, of various minor figures (one of them played by Elizabeth McGovern) in an important phase of Lily's story, is not conveyed with the clarity required. Sometimes, even for this critic, a little exposition is necessary.

Another aspect of Wharton's novel, and an important one, I think, is the theme of women's subjection. The fact that the women she depicts are wealthy, or at least accustomed to wealth, does not alter the fact that their choices are determined by a social imperative which places all their worth in an ability to marry well. We may flatter ourselves that we are entirely free of this imperative today, but it might be better to recognize the degree to which we still retain these assumptions. More pointed still is the way Lily's innocent mistakes are used as evidence against her character. Wharton knew that men like Gus Trenor could do as they pleased, while enforcing the strictest and most unforgiving moral code on women. And this particular battle is still being fought as well.

The House of Mirth is film of subtlety and intelligence and visual poetry, a criticism of life in the guise of a social tragedy. It has inner integrity, beauty, and an astonishing central performance from Gillian Anderson. It should be praised and honored, not shunted to the side and discounted as it has been, but such is the state of things that the best work seems inevitably to be confined to the margins. That I still don't accept this state of things is, I suppose, a sign of stubbornness.

Reading the reviews of The House of Mirth has caused me to ponder the idea of the "period film." Many of the reviews were positive, I must admit, but even some of those fell prey to this conception. More than once, the names of Merchant/Ivory came up, as in: this film is like Merchant/Ivory, except darker. The implication is that films set in the past, particularly in the centuries before people started chewing gum and wearing sneakers, are basically alike, and for the most part diversions with limited relevance to our own times. There is also, I sense, a feeling that only effete literary types can, or should, enjoy them.

Strangely, I never heard Gladiator referred to as a period film. I think this is due to the fact that reproductions of ancient times seem closer to fantasy. Filmmakers tend to project more anachronisms onto ancient stories - and Gladiator was certainly no exception in this regard. But also, I think, the sword and sandal epics play more to the desire for violent spectacle and gross melodrama, and thus more closely reflect the prevailing ethos of mass culture, with its trumped up conflicts between noble good guys and debauched, decadent bad guys. (The bad guys are always more fun to watch, and that betrays the real motive of these films.) "Period" films, often adapted from classic authors such as Jane Austen or Henry James, offer criticisms of life and culture which are not escapist in nature, however pleasant they may be in form. They get branded, therefore, with being intellectual - a bad word in this country - or for being aimed exclusively at women. And here we have the phrases "chick flicks" and "guy flicks" and "date flicks" and so on, all of which amounts to a depressing commentary on the prevailing unconsciousness and idiocy of popular culture.

But I digress. The main point here is that there is this opinion which seems to have swayed the majority of film critics, and that is that the period film is irrelevant to the concerns of modern times. These societies that are portrayed, so the litany goes, are so outmoded - that is, we have so far outgrown the past - that we can learn nothing from their stories that could serve us today. Even the ideas that are presented in Merchant /Ivory "type" films - dismissed automatically as "costume drama" by many - are generally missed or ignored even by the fans of those films. Instead we have folks going to see Sense and Sensibility or some such, so they can be entertained of an evening, which in itself is fine, but then we see the same approach undermining the reception of a more thoughtful work such as Jane Campion's The Portrait of a Lady.

Now, as to this prevailing opinion about period films I would like to point out a conspicuous, and hopefully disturbing, fact. The great literary cultures of human history were not afraid to take their themes from the past. Homer and the tragedians told stories of figures from many centuries past - and they told them over and over. What are Shakespeare's greatest works? Well, certainly among them are Macbeth, King Lear, and Julius Caesar, to name only a few - all portraying characters of the distant and mythical past. And then there are his so-called histories - Richard III, Henry IV, and so on. Certainly there have always been works of art that depict the present as well, but never a great culture that relied solely on the present and disdained any wisdom to be gained from an artwork that drew on the past for inspiration.

My conclusion from all this is that a culture that looks down upon the so-called period film, or in fact uses such a category to describe a film, is not an intelligent culture at all, nor a culture in tune with modern times, or whatever other nonsense is put forward as a justification. No, it is barbarism, pure and simple, and evidence that we live in a kind of cultural dark age. We might as well just stop washing or using forks.

On to another period. Recently there seem to be quite a few movies set in the early sixties, or late fifties. Does this time symbolize a lost innocence? The Bridge takes place in 1962, in France. Jules and Jim is playing at the local cinema. Rock and roll is beginning to be heard on the airwaves. Against this background of newness and change (which now seems heavy with nostalgia) the film tells the story of Mina, a housewife (Carole Bouquet) in a stagnant marriage to a laborer (Gerard Depardieu). She falls in love and has an affair with an engineer (George Berling) who happens to be managing the construction of the bridge her husband is working on.

The familiar theme of the triangle is given a slightly new twist here. Mina jumps into the affair without much struggle, and despite all the elements in her situation which she expects to make her feel terribly guilty - a lonely, trusting husband working away from home, a teenage son who knows and resents what she is doing and yet covers up for her - she doesn't suffer very much at all, but instead feels an emotional awakening that keeps her going back to her lover.

The writer, Francois Dupeyron, has cleverly turned expectations on their head. If the story's deck had been stacked in favor of the wife - if she had been abused, for instance - then the choice she is confronted with would not be so clear. As it is, although George (Depardieu) is a bit of a lunk - they married because he got her pregnant - he is kind and he truly loves his wife. Furthermore, the son has every right to be angry at his mother's thoughtless and irresponsible behavior, in which she essentially abandons him. But the point is that she has never been in love before, and she finds that she must choose between happiness and responsibility. It is to the film's credit that this is depicted as a choice at all, and that the woman, furthermore, is empowered with this choice.

I wish that the movie completely lived up to its promise. It is co- directed by Depardieu and Frederic Aubertin, and despite the film's delicate color palette, and some nice scenic touches, it has a rather plodding and pedestrian style. Berling seems an unsympathetic lover. We see the passion in Mina's eyes, but it's hard to imagine how this man inspires that passion. There are no major missteps, but no real relevations either. It is a minor film in a minor key, but it is helped immeasurably by one thing - the role of Mina is played by Carole Bouquet.

One of France's biggest stars, but scarcely known in the states, she is so completely natural and affecting here that she carries the picture. This is the kind of intense charisma that used to define stardom, except that not only does Bouquet (over forty and still incredibly beautiful) compel the audience's identification, but brings a subjective presence of great dignity to her character. We are not invited to admire or condemn, only to experience the humanity of a woman making a choice, for weal or woe.

There are movies to see for their artistic unity, visual brilliance, or dramatic power. Then, sometimes, there are movies that are only middling efforts, but you see them for the presence of a star. See this one for Carol Bouquet.

***

Once in a blue moon, an "art house" gets lucky. My local theater has been up for sale almost a year now, and no takers. Sometimes there are a only a half dozen people with me reading subtitles in the dark. Recently, though, they managed to get Pollock. I don't know, I guess the cineplexes took a pass because, like, it's about a painter, you know, not a hit man or a hot horny teen. But lo and behold, a few Oscar nominations later, and a win for Marcia Gay Harden, and there are lines waiting to get in. Here's hoping that helps pay the rent for a few months.....

CineScene, 2001