EFFIE GRAY (2014/15)
Directed by Richard
Laxton
Sovereign Films, 108
minutes, PG-13 (brief nudity)
* *
Emma Thompson has many talents, but script writing is not
one of them. Effie Gray tells the
story of spirited Scots lass Euphemia Gray (1828-1897) and her disastrous
marriage to English art critic John Ruskin (1819-1900), one that took place in
1848 and was annulled in 1854. It is such a fascinating tale that it has been
the subject of numerous well-received plays and books though, alas, this
(rightly) is not among the highly regarded.
Effie is played quite well by Dakota Fanning, though Ruskin
(Thompson's husband, Tom Wise) is miscast. Effie
Gray begins like a classic case of cradle robbing, with Fanning looking to
be about 16 and Ruskin a gray-templed man in his 40s who weds a girl of whom
his parents disapproved. This is the first of numerous liberties taken. In
truth, the Ruskins and Grays knew each other well, with the latter residing in
a home in which Ruskin's grandfather had committed suicide. John Ruskin had
literally known Effie since she was a child, but it wasn't quite as creepy as
the film suggests–he was just nine years her senior, not decades, and such an
age gap was hardly unusual in Victorian times. But it is true enough that
Ruskin, though a brilliant intellect, was a distasteful man and likely impotent
as well. Legend holds that when Effie disrobed on their wedding night, Ruskin
was disgusted to see that she had pubic hair—unlike the Greek statues he
admired—and never consummated a marriage that ended five plus years later with
Mrs. Ruskin still intact.
The film gets the vibe of Effie's monastic existence right–the
feeling of being a virtual prisoner in a life devoid of work, duty, or meaning.
When she accompanies John to Venice and is allowed to explore the city, go
dancing, and participate in society, the Italian light serves only to magnify
her husband's coldness and Effie realizes her need to do something about her
circumstances. (Hey, if you can't be romantic in Venice, carnality is off the
menu!) Effie lapses into a neurasthenia made worse by the laudanum-laced "medicine" with which her
evil mother-in-law (Julie Walters) plies her and only starts to come back to
life when she returns to Scotland with her husband and his protégé,
pre-Raphaelite painter John Everett Millais (Tom Sturridge). After her
annulment, Effie married Millais and bore him eight children before his death
in 1896.
Where to begin with the film's problems? Although the vibe
is right, it's exceedingly dull to watch a film in which very little happens.
Wise's Ruskin is so buttoned-down that he reacts to nothing; hence there are no
big scenes and little drama other than that conveyed by Fanning's sad doe eyes.
We get lots of nice scenery—Venice, the Scottish Trossachs, English manor
houses–but we could get that from Google Images. Don't expect to learn a lot
about art either; there's hardly a word about the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood
and only a smattering of paintings filmed from British museum walls and snipped
into the film. One is Millais's famed "Ophelia," and it's implied
that Effie was its inspiration—and Ophelia's face does bear resemblance to
Fanning's—but the model was actually Elizabeth Siddal, not Gray. Also wasted is
a superb cast that includes cameos from heavyweights such as Walters, Claudia
Cardinale, James Fox, Derek Jacobi, Emma Thompson, and David Suchet. Given the
period setting of this film, one could say this is literally a case of a cast
all dressed up with nowhere to go. And that's where this film went as
well–after Thompson fended off two lawsuits from playwrights alleging copyright
infringement, this $11 million film garnered weak reviews, and made just over
$368,000 at the box office. That's a bomb by any measure.
Should you download it? It's up to you. Effie Gray isn't terrible, but that's largely because it takes more
energy to create camp. Rob Weir
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