'Brideshead Revisitied' originally aired on Britain's ITV network between October and December 1981 and then on Public television in the United States from January 1982. At the time Britain was beset by 3 million unemployed, race riots and the IRA bombing campaign. The series was tonic for a grim nation, providing a window on a halcyon pre-war England and a lifestyle of excessive extravagance that served as a kind of escapism for the middle class and literate viewer.
In 2008, with a similar economic recession afflicting Britain and the Western world, there appears a new 'Brideshead Revisited' - glossily shot, designed and costumed, full of golden pre-war summers, vintage cars, stately homes and, at the centre, the sort of privileged upper class family who were already in decline. The best way to approach this new version of the Evelyn Waugh novel is as highlights from 'Brideshead Revisited' rather than a definitive version. Director Julian Jarrold and writers Jeremy Block and Andrew Davies have produced a work which feels like it's rushing through the highlights of the story. Unlike the television series, they do not have eleven and a half hours to play with. It starts confusingly - first a shot of middle-aged army captain Charles Ryder (Matthew Goode) billeted at Brideshead stately home in wartime England, then we flashback to him abroad a transatlantic liner, before settling down to Charles arriving at Oxford sometime in the 1920s.
Charles becomes involved with a flamboyant homosexual aristocratic student called Sebastian Flyte (Ben Wishaw), first seen vomiting through Charles' room window. Their relationship draws Charles into the world of the Flyte family - his beautiful sister Julia (Hayley Atwell), his manipulative mother Lady Marchmain (Emma Thompson) and his lapsed Catholic father Lord Marchmain (Michael Gambon), now living in sin in Venice. Charles grows more and more attached to Julia, Sebastian succumbs to alcoholism and ends up an alcoholic wreck in North Africa. Charles and Julia are reunited a decade later when Charles is now a painter and she now a divorcée.
There are so many themes at the core of 'Brideshead Revisited' - the last days of the English upper classes, Catholicism, alcoholism and homosexuality - that the film can only touch on them. In that sense it makes for an unsatisfactory experience. The first half works fine, helped enormously by the cast. Hayley Atwell is a surprisingly sexy and gorgeous Julia; Emma Thompson dominates all of her scenes as Lady Matchmain and Goode and Wishaw inhabit their roles in a way which never reminded me of Jeremy Irons and Anthony Andrews in the TV series. Sebastian is such a fascinating character and his descent into alcoholism so tragic that once he vanishes from the film, it's sorely felt. Also, the role of his sister Cordelia - the most enchanting and likable character in the original - has been trimmed to just 3 scenes, though Patrick Malahide makes the most of his role as Charles's droll and comical father.
Beautifully shot by Jesse Hall, the real star is Castle Howard again reprising its role as Bridheshead. A commendable film which somehow fails to sustain interest for its entire running time.
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