The Personal History of David Copperfield

We have had plenty of Jane Austin inspired films in the last few years, including a charming version of "Emma" earlier this year. It's time for a change up, but not too big a change, so we will stick to 19th century English writes, but change genders, decades and primary locations. Who is in the mood for some Charles Dickens?

I'd not seen the trailer for this film before we went to the movies, in fact, I don't even think I'd heard of it, but it was the weekend, theaters are opening up, and this was not "The New Mutants" so it became the designated choice for Saturday afternoon. From the start, you can tell this will be an interesting approach to telling the well worn story of David Copperfield. The opening of the film is set up like it was a lecture hall, and the audience was certainly more diverse than you would have seen in 1840's London. That is one of the winning choices of the film makers. Casting was dictated not by historical accuracy or by Dickens's description per se, but by the ability of actors to be charming in the roles that they are cast in. Our hero is portrayed as an adult by Dev Patel, not a traditional Englishmen of the stage. He is delightful in the role, and I have been a fan since "Slumdog Millionaire".  He has an earnestness that matches well with the Dickensian moods of our hero. I assume that the young Ranveer Jaiswal  was chosen to play the young David Copperfield because he matched up with Patel in many ways, but the way that is most important is demeanor rather than appearance and that worked here.

Director/writer Armando Iannucci is familiar to me because of two films, "In the Loop" which was a MOTM on the LAMB three years ago, and "The Death of Stalin" which was widely hailed and recommended to me. Both films were solid comedies with a bent to them that is very distinctive, and that sensibility is also found in this movie, at least in a few spots. I had some reservations because the framing device and transition to the traditional narration felt a bit frantic and unclear at the beginning. It was as if the director was struggling to signal that this is a comedy, while still trying to retain the elements of Copperfield that are not really funny. The whole thing settles down after about ten minutes and the more straightforward narrative takes over. There are still plenty of the odd moments and stylings that Iannucci is well known for, but it fills the story rather than driving it as we go along.

I recognized Peter Capaldi, not from Dr. Who, which I don't watch, but from "In the Loop" and the "Paddington" films. I thought he was a perfect Mr. Micawber, and every time he showed up the movie was funny again. Hugh Laurie, who plays Mr. Dick, was also a comforting comical presence. Both of these actors are capable of playing off absurd circumstances yet still pulling some poignant moments amid the craziness. My guess is that most of the cast will be far more recognizable to Brits than we colonists, because they all seem very good, so they probably work in television programming or theater that is more U.K. centered. 

The casting of romantic counterparts in the film might be a little precocious since the point seemed to be to emphasize the lack of ethnocentricity,  The actors are so good however, that what might have been seen as an affectation, turns out to be barely noticeable. Rosalind Eleazar as Agnes, a love interest for Patel, and the daughter of Benedict Wong's Mr. Wickfield, crossed two ethic boundaries at once and we don't care at all. This is the sort of casting I think would address the desire for diversity without drawing attention to the fact that you are trying to do that.

For a complicated story, the film is paced pretty well. I do think that the opening section with the awful Mr. Murdstone needed to fleshed out a bit more, but perhaps the youthful Copperfield isn't where the writer found the most joy in the story. If you are able to see the film, by all means do so. I think it would be easy to peg the costumes for awards consideration at the end of the year. The clothes help make the characters easy to understand and entertaining simultaneously. Copperfield has some tragic moments but this production does not dwell on them, it acknowledges those points but move quickly to it's objective, which is to amuse us. The return of the bookend devices toward the end of the film are much less jarring than at the start of the story and they finish things off nicely.

Unhinged

The drought was over last weekend, when I went to a theater to see a movie. after five long months of Covid-19 closures. That movie was " Jurassic Park" a film that I've written about many times already. So there was not really a need to have an in-depth look at that film. This week however, I am celebrating a new film, being released in theaters and it is fresh for comment, "Unhinged". This is a brutal piece of exploitation film making, featuring a major star in a basic plot, which gets a few nods to social relevance, but it is really designed to screw up the tension level and cause you periodic moments of revulsion. In other words, it was a great movie for me to get back to a theater and blogging.

Russel Crowe is the great white shark in this movie. I mean that figuratively for the most part, although his physical presence in film in the last decade have in fact suggested that Quint was right in assessing the weight of the opposition. Crowe plays a character listed in the credits as "The Man", an interesting coincidence sine the last film posted on this site "The Naked Prey" also features the same credit for the lead actor. Ay one point the character introduces himself as Tom Cooper, so I'm going to refer to him by that name for the rest of this entry. Cooper is a disturbed man, who we know immediately is going to be trouble. There is a pre-title sequence that establishes with violence from a distance, that Tom has lost all sense of proportion or reasonableness. This may work against the story a bit in the long run because we are never going to listen to the perspective he articulates and the background set up in the title sequences will become irrelevant. Tom is a bad man who can feign politeness for a few moments but ultimately will reveal himself as a lost monster.

Actress Caren Pistorius has to carry most of the film herself by reacting to phone calls and traffic encounters. There are a few moments of human interaction but they pass by pretty quickly. This movie is likely to do for road rage acts of expression, what "Fatal Attraction" did for extra-marital affairs, scare the potential bird flipper away from such emotional outbursts. Although there is a self righteous payoff line at the climax of the film, the real coda happens a few minutes later when Caren is reminded of how this whole day turned into a nightmare for her in the first place. I don't think we should all assume that the worst possible thing that could happen will be the most likely thing to happen, but a little perspective is not a bad thing. Unfortunately, because we know from the start how awful the antagonist is, that perspective will not get a hearing.

Trying to turn a road rage incident into a movie is possible. Spielberg did it fifty years ago with "Duel".  This script however goes in some very different directions based on the level of privacy we give up by using smart phones. I can't say what technological innovations will make those plot devices irrelevant in twenty years, but there will certainly be something. Like people today who laugh at classic films that use the absence of a phone in a remote location as a plot device, someday, the content of phones will seem like an antiquated tool for storytelling.  The movie suffers from a few of the traditional plot holes that these sorts of movies suffer from. The main protagonist makes some dumb choices, the villain has prescient sight, and abilities that are far deeper and quicker than the average person can manage. The cops, who in real life have helicopters chasing drivers who run after a bad traffic light call, can't seem to get it together enough to track, pursue and capture a man that has committed multiple atrocities and continues to do so. This is movie story telling, not the real world.

Let's put all that aside for a moment. Crowe plays the maniac with enough range to make the character somewhat compelling. The vehicle jump scares and action beats are always effective, and the resolution meets our need for retribution and recovery. It's not a great movie, but it came at a great time for me. I can't stay locked down forever, and escapist fare like this helps quite a bit. And as this poster tells you. I saw it in a theater.