Essential Cinema - 29

Great Expectations


ACTORS:
John Mills
Tony Wager
Valerie Hobson
Jean Simmons
Bernard Miles
Francis L. Sullivan
Finlay Currie
Martita Hunt
Alec Guinness
Ivor Barnard
Freda Jackson
Eileen Erskine
George Hayes

DIRECTOR
David Lean

SCREENPLAY
Charles Dickens (novel)
Anthony Havelock-Allan (adaptation)

CINEMATOGRAPHER
Guy Green




SYNOPSIS:
A poor orphan is given the chance to become an English Gentlemen by an anonymous patron in Victorian England. Along the way he discovers how the deeds of his past have shaped his future.






CONCEPT IN RELATION TO THE VIEWER:
No good deed goes un-noticed, and good character and devotion have their merits in the end. Sometime we chart our own course in life and other times it is charted for us.






PROS AND CONS
I am a big fan of David Lean's work. Along with Stanley Kubrick, Robert Wise, Federico Fellini and Steven Spielberg, they have taken the art of film making to new levels. This is the reason that I wanted to see this film. An early work of Lean's with Charles Dickens as the inspiration. I was not disappointed.






As I started watching this film, all of the Lean trademarks started to shine through even at this early stage of his career. The beautiful cinematography, the framing of the character, the pacing were all there. After the first 10 minutes I was hooked on this film and couldn't stop watching it.






The characters are classical Dickens, eccentric and quirky. The look of the film is a dream-like 18th Century England where some of the scenes of London look as though they were from a Disney film. Each of the actors gives a strong performances. The best performance is turned in by Francis L. Sullivan as Mr. Jaggers, the puppet master attorney that is entrusted with overseeing Pips transformation from country bumpkin to high society gentlemen.






I didn't realize it until I was reading the credits that the character of Mr. Pocket is played by a very young Alec Guinness. The actor that portrayed Colonel Nickelson on "Bridge on the River Kawi", King Fisal in "Laurence of Arabia" and Obi-Wan Kenobi in "Star Wars", is a young man of 20 and is just recognizable in this film.






There is little to detract from this film, with the exception of a few scenes that are thrown in to appease the Dicken's purist. These scenes serve to highlight quirky and odd ball characters in the Dicken's universe, but do little to move the plot forward. Over all a very good film that was much better than I expected, with engaging characters and a plot that will keep you guessing until the very end.