Our Mutual Friend
Our Mutual Friend is another Dicken’s story that makes me wonder why the Brontës usually get the a hard time about being dark. Compared with Dickens, they’re sunshiney tales on level with Austen! What with the beatings and murders and drowning and nasty characters in just OMF, he could depress a Bingley. Were it not for the fact that Dickens likes happy endings (for his good characters at least; he is rather like Miss Prism in The Importance of Being Earnest), he would be swiftly forgotten.
OMF, though, is a wonderful story, in spite of its dark undertones. The point on which the whole plot hinges is the death of John Harmon, an estranged son who had just inherited a fortune and was on his way home, when he was found drowned. One aspect of his father’s will was that, to inherit the fortune, John Harmon had to marry one Bella Wilfer, a girl he had never met. John Harmon’s father’s right-hand-man inherits the fortune, and uses it wisely and kindly, taking in Bella because her hopes have been dashed. Bella is a selfish and mercenary girl who grows throughout the movie, mostly through her relationship with John Rokesmith and Lizzy Hexam. Lizzy Hexam is the daughter of the boatman who is suspected of having murdered John Harmon. The detective in the case, Mortimer Lightwood, and his friend, the lazy Eugene Wrayburn, investigate the Hexams, and Eugene falls for the pretty and good Lizzy. After her father dies, Lizzy moves to the city, where the even-more-entranced Eugene visits her often. The stories of Bella and Lizzy become increasingly more interesting and more tangled as the movie goes on, and reach a final and happy climax like all Dickens’ stories.
The acting is quite excellent, expecially on the part of the four main characters: Bella, Lizzy, Rokesmith, and Eugene; and the script is less dull than some BBC productions. The only downside is the length. Some movies can be long and worth it, but OMF suffers from an obsessive need to have every character and scene from the book, even if it makes certain parts dreadfully dull and easily skipped. The character of Mr. Venus could have been easily cut out, as well as that of the Lamleys, and just those two edits would have made it vastly more enjoyable. But if you can get past the dull parts, you will fall in love with the main characters, and find a pair of wonderful loves stories from my favorite of Dicken’s works.
4 comments:
I'm guessing you haven't read the book yet? Because 1, they do not have every single character and scene from the book, and 2, it's Lammle not Lamley.
But we find it at all dull, or even very dark. And I miss all of Twemlow. They didn't do full justice to Mrs. Lammle, which was slightly sad.
No, I've read it. I read it before I watched OMF the first time, about two years ago. I didn't mean literally every character, I just meant they had characters that seemed to have no purpose. As for the spelling, in my review of A Civil Contract I spelled a name Chawley, when it is actually Chawleigh. Sometimes I forget to make sure about names.
I never said it was dull; I like it very much. I just said that I thought some parts were dull. I found it very dark because of all the drownings, and Mr. Headstone and his beating of Eugene. I don't like watching that, and most period movies don't have it. In fact, I think I've only seen that sort of stuff in Dickens. (According to an essay I read, Trollope is Sense, and Dickens is Sensibility. If you've read them, you'll see why that's apt.)
OMF is one of our favorite movies! I've never read the book, though.
Post a Comment