Great Expectations

SPOILER ALERT--This movie royally sucked!!

If you know me at all, you will know that one of my favorite novels is the Dickens classic Great Expectations (it's o.k. if you didn't). I also like The Great Gatsby, and It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown (not a novel).

Although The Great Gatsby was passable with it's gorgeous art direction and costumes, and It's The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown is some of the best work Linus ever did, I am sad to say that the third installment of the movie version (or cartoon) of the three greatest novels (or cartoon) with the word 'great' in the title fell far short of it's predecessors.

I shouldn't be surprised; I had heard that this movie wasn't very good (read awful), but I remained hopeful because I thought it had a lot going for it (Gwyneth Paltrow naked). Besides being a fantastic story that ought to lend itself well to screenwriters*, it was also directed by the talented Alfonso Cuarón, (Y Tu Mamá También, The Prisoner of Azkaban, Children of Men) and stars the beautiful Gwyneth Paltrow (naked).

To be honest, I don't know where it went wrong, so let's just start at the beginning where it was decided that the story would not open in rural England in the 1800's, but in the Gulf of Mexico in the 1980's. While this is not in and of itself an error, it did pose a problem for some of the character development down the road, particularly that of Finn, played by an extremely groggy Ethan Hawke, and his Uncle Joe, played by Chris Cooper.

At the risk of sounding trite, one of the main conflicts in the novel is class struggle--something the British are pro at. For some reason, the makers of the film decided to gloss over this. In the film it is shown and even stated that Finn comes from humble beginnings, but it is not an obstacle the way it is in the book. Rather than undergoing a transformation as he ascends the social trellis, his manners are static throughout because he is never really made to feel ashamed of who he is. During an important scene in which he is confronted by his past, the extent to which he shows his frustration is to raise his voice (kind of) when a tray of drinks is spilled by his bumbling Uncle.

Moreover, the title Great Expectations was meant by Dickens to be ironic in light of how little Pip** accomplishes once he is handed his fortune. For some reason, in the movie it was decided that Finn should be not only a talented young artist, but also an unbridled success in high society, the feature of publications and interviews, and all the while being told that he is a wonderful painter (he isn't).

This movie also contains one too many of the following montages:

Ethan Hawke running through a rainstorm in a suit.
Ethan Hawke dancing on a rooftop with a bottle.
A crazy old bat dancing to salsa music.
Ethan Hawke working hard on his art.

But perhaps the worst thing about this movie, besides the final scene, was the soundtrack, from the dreadful montage of Finn's drawing session with Estella (Paltrow), right down to Mr. Hawke's narration, I was continuously being abused in entirely unexpected ways by the audio. I actually threw up in my mouth a few times.

What the fuck? Never in my wildest dreams did I think that this movie would be so badly mishandled. As the credits rolled, my wife and I could only repeat variations on the sentence, "Expletive, that sucked!"

But the best thing that happened was during the credits, which feature an illustrative smattering of Finn's art, when I noticed a drawing of a very simply rendered life-preserver which covers the page from edge to edge. If you know me at all, you will know that I have made more than one drawing that looks exactly like this.

Rats.

One star (Gwyneth Paltrow naked).


* Dickens originally wrote it as a serial for newspapers. Each chapter ends with a dramatic cliff-hanger so that the readers would have to buy the next paper to see what happened.

** Pip was the original name of the character in the novel. It was inexplicably changed to Finn by the Hollywood geniuses who hammered out the details.