Gothic
Adaptations and Literary Mysteries
by
Kristin Battestella
Although
some of these contemporary movies and miniseries based on books are
better than others are, the literary adaptations herein exude plenty
of gothic atmosphere, mood, and mystery.
The Limehouse Golem –
Sublime frocks, décor, carriages, and top hats accent the 1880
bodies in the bed, poisoned cordials, and bloody riddles opening this
2016 serial killer about Londontown adapted by Jane Goldman (X:Men: First Class) from the Peter
Ackroyd novel. Red gore, orange lighting, and green hues befitting
the title join pink and gold dance halls, sing songs, and theatrical
cross dressing as Bill Nighy's (Underworld)
Inspector Kildare avoids the sensational headlines and public
bloodlust in favor of handwriting analysis and murderous journals.
Messy footprints, missing police reports, and polluted crime scenes
don't need any modern stylistic intrusions – the intercut discovery
mixed with on stage recountings of the kills, disjointed past and
present point of views, and non-linear editing are unnecessary. Fast
moving abusive childhood flashbacks within murder trials when we've
hardly met everybody make the focus of the story unclear, the
assistant constable repeats everything the inspector already knows
just for redundant audience exposition, and the gay comments about
Kildare are useless. Famous names, library clues, dance hall girls,
jealous playwrights, and life imitating art plays let the evidence
speak for itself, piecing together the case with scribble in the book
margins, secondhand shop keeper connections, and inspector deduction.
Distorted voiceovers, violent slicings, backstage nudity, accidents
on theater stairs, and religious undercurrents set off the deceased's
recounting of the crimes in fantasy-esque flashbacks repeated with
each suspect as the killer. These brutal horror reenactments compete
with the song and dance flashbacks, but they also help blur the
investigation as important details aren't shared with the kangaroo
trials, distracting the audience as information is given and taken
for shock value or cinematic reasons when key evidence, set ups, and
relationships would be obvious if anyone but Kildare was paying
attention. The persons of interest, backstage investigations, play
clues, deflection, and one on one interviews are better once the
flashbacks stop and the real time case proceeds. There must be a
reason why the crimes have stopped – what we need to know is given
in the opening scene – and all the back and forth delaying belies
viewers into how little time has passed and why the police are
unaware the killer hasn't struck again. Longtime viewers of British
period mysteries may see through this faulty veneer with padding
misinformation and meandering backstory in need of tighter direction
rather than style over substance. Fortunately, there's an interesting
mystery, multiple suspects, numerous kills, and suspicious ties
between them as the execution order counts down to the finish. The
infamous show must go on no matter how many people die for it, and
this is fun for fans of Steampunk style mysteries.
Rebecca
– Artistic ingenue Emilia Fox (Merlin)
– companion to wealthy gossip Faye Dunaway (Don Juan DeMarco) –
is
smitten by the suave yet mysterious Charles Dance (Bleak House) in
this 1997 three hour
Masterpiece
adaptation of the Daphne Du Maurier novel. Sublime style, flapper
headbands, candlelight, and long stem cigarettes add to the whirlwind
1927 Riviera's scenic drives, classic convertibles, and charming
hats. Unlike the immediately gothic gray scale of Alfred Hitchcock's
1940 version, vivid color and visual depth layer this initially
idyllic romance. Our unusual couple have each been shy, lonely, and
sad, but Maxim de Winter admires this young lady's innocence and
honesty compared to the gilded aristocracy. Picnics, boat rides, a
silly girl, a foolish old man – can they make a go of their
differences? The dangerous curves and perilous drives suggest
something slightly sinister brewing amid glimpses of the
unforgettable and beloved by all Rebecca. It's been a year since her
death, yet everyone must remind Maxim of his late wife upon this
surprising second marriage. The newlyweds return to the lovely
English gardens and proper decorum at Manderley, the estate where the
Emmy winning Diana Rigg's (On Her Majesty's Secret Service)
icy housekeeper Mrs. Danvers won't let go of the first Mrs.
DeWinter's memory. The household reception is awkward and chilly –
the coastal brightness turns darker thanks to shadow schemes,
lighting changes, and the looming silhouettes of both Mrs. Danvers
and Rebecca. Despite being a large estate with a west wing facing the
sea, the hefty staircases, huge windows, and great fireplace feel
congested, closing in on the new, nervous Mrs. as she gets lost
wandering the shuttered parts of the house, breaks priceless statues,
and hangs her head like an admonished little girl. She doesn't fit
into the upper class routine, but the brooding, often misunderstood
Maxim doesn't want her to become like those other cruel, aristocratic
dames. Everyone is so heavy handed, formal, and not just unhelpful
but resentful of how unlike Rebecca she is, and the couple regrets
returning home to the rocky cliffs, beach side cottages, and
distrustful staff. Crazy hermits, past gossip, vogue cousins too
close for comfort, recreating previous fancy dress balls, and one big
costuming faux pas strain the relationship further, but she can't
exactly ask her new husband about why the pieces on how Rebecca
drowned aren't coming together. Her room is still kept as is, almost
in worship where our devoted housekeeper can express her creepy
vicarious and pathetic intimacy, re-enacting brushing her madam's
hair and laying out her perfumed night gown. Was Rebecca really so
perfect? If she wasn't would anybody actually say so? Her presence is
overwhelming – not because of any actually supernatural mood or
ghost, but because the obsessed Mrs. Danvers won't let anyone forget,
placing the fanatical pressures of her devotion on the second Mrs. de
Winter. Foreboding strings add more ominous, however the suspense is
certainly helped by Maxim's not coming clean on his life with Rebecca
at the start. While some scenes are very similar to Hitchcock's
vision, this is also closer to the novel, and even if you've seen
other adaptations, viewers are swept up in wondering how the secrets
will play out in the finale. Fog, vintage boats, watery evidence,
mistaken identities, inquests – the circumstances surrounding
Rebecca's life and death come to light, but our servant oversteps her
bounds with cruelty, jealousy, and bullying suicidal whispers just to
assure the Rebecca everyone thought they knew and loved won't die.
Though more romantic than true crime, the fresh love and warped
liaisons are told swift and honestly as the scandalous true colors
are revealed with fainting spells, medical discoveries, fiery
rescues, and kisses in the rain. Indeed all the gothic staples are
here with period mood and performances to match.
Split
Opinion
The Moonstone
– This five part 2016 series based on the Wilkie Collins novel
opens with funerals, church bells, top hats, and tombstones before
gloomy Yorkshire estates and a family cursed to unhappiness thanks to
the eponymous plundering. Flashbacks to the pleasant year before
recount the colorful gowns, piano music, painting, kissing cousins,
and birthday gifts. There are, however, prowlers, suspicious
visitors, dangerous beaches, melodramatic maids, rival suitors, and
awkward dinners. This was not the day to quit tobacco! One and all
pass around the diamond – broadcasting its whereabouts before
immediately suspecting the “gibberish speaking” foreigners among
them of its theft. The hysterical birthday girl doesn't want a public
scandal, refusing to speak with the police who bungle the case with a
contaminated scene thanks to a meddling maid made obvious by the
ominous music. Men are worried about rectifying their reputations
over the lost gem, but one wonders why they go through the trouble
when the lady herself impedes them amid nonsensical red herrings,
cluttered pacing, spliced editing, and foreboding fake outs. The
revisiting flashbacks and present conjecture interrupt the tension
with coming and going scenes or up and down stairs transitions
stalling the seeking of clues while questionable colonial aspects,
off humor, and poor acting parodies the deduction with overly
pompous, long winded dialogue, and faux sophistication. London to
Yorkshire travel looks instantaneous, and timeline breaks should
bookend episodes only instead of deflecting the mystery. A ham-fisted
superintendent, busybody relations, and back and forth blaming
contests hinder the case further with stupid snobbery. Itemized
prophecies with clues, convoluted letters, second hand evidence, and
missing people string the messy in the wrong direction. The
meandering points of view and uneven framing don't build characters
or suspense, and viewers already have precious little sympathy since
our supposedly so in love cousin so adamant about the girl and
resolving the theft up and left for an entire year. Timely deaths,
mysterious wills, suspicious marriage proposals, and coastal rescues
finally provide something incriminating halfway thru Episode Four as
love sick letters recount how the subservient people of the house
were lost amid all the upper class hullabaloo. Eyewitness
unreliability and laudanum stupor add to the painting clues and
prospective motives while secret passages and potential suicides
culminate in jeweler trades, bank stakeouts, and bodies at the hotel.
Although this comes together in the last half hour, the presentation
continually goes back to the night of the crime where it never should
have left all the action in the first place. Characters themselves
ask how they are always back where they started, but the insipid
performances can't disguise the Twelve Days of Christmas cumulative –
each hour adds a superfluous person who knows what happened then who
travels to read a letter revealing what happened the Monday after the
Wednesday that the moonstone was stolen. Such treading tires impedes
the game afoot, and there's never a sense that anyone is closer to
solving the mystery. This is fine for audiences who like period piece
whodunits, yet such an audience is already well versed enough to be
frustrated by this piecemeal structure. The series is twice as long
as it should be when a streamlined, feature length design would have
sufficed. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Disappointing
Labyrinth
– Christopher Smith (Black Death) directs
medieval
heroine Jessica Brown Findlay (Downton Abbey), bad
girl Katie McGrath (Merlin),
Malfoy
in a greasy wig Tom Felton
(Harry Potter), gigolo
writer never seen writing Sebastian Stan (Avengers:
Infinity War), annoying
creep Emun Elliot (The Paradise),
and the under utilized John Hurt (Only Lovers Left Alive) in
this 2012 two-parter based upon the Kate Mosse book. Opening scrolls
set the 1209 Carcassonne scene with Catharism sects, reincarnation,
and Holy Grail secrets before contemporary archaeology digs and caves
with ancient writings. Although the men's armor looks cheap, the
medieval costumes have the right silhouette – healers, herbs, and
woodwork create period detail while scenic bridges, horses, and
country beauty belie ominous bodies in the river, missing fingers,
and mysterious books. Unfortunately, this telling of two tales at
once is immediately confusing with lookalike sisters both introduced
in sex scenes with the same man and a modern woman who takes on this
archaeology thing after a bad break up, goes into a cave during an
earthquake, and is rightfully chastised for her amateur contamination
of the site. While a book can go back and forth per chapter, this
television film juggles too much. The Old Speaketh is try hard and
everybody in France speaks unaccented English as crusader
persecutions are intercut with good cop/bad cop interrogations.
Secret brotherhood meetings, double crossing contacts, another
corporate woman introduced with a nooner – we're still meeting
everybody an hour into the story thanks to the spliced presentation.
Longer scenes building tension between the sisters, car accident
shockers, and hooded rituals with candles and daggers better show the
medieval past and present, and the two parts should have had all the
past action naturally building to the present intrigue. Why tell in a
current research montage when we can see that past suspense? The
uneven structure cheats with women from different times in the same
frame or place just for visual effect, delaying the storytelling with
attempted edgy. Hot guys in the pool, iPod mentions – leave your
number by typing it into some man's phone, is that for real? – and
forced chemistry aren't as interesting as a Book of Potions or
religious protectors. Secret society bad guys chase something so
important one moment only to call it an irrelevant loose end the
next, people with answers go unutilized, and clues are waiting in an
inherited house but nobody goes there. A righteous thug with a
silencer shooting people for not going to confession and information
easily given that should have come sooner are too convenient as
neither past nor present is primary thanks to no sense of danger and
the thin women's tropes such as the one-dimensional illegitimate
naked bad girl scorned threatening a man with cries of rape. It's
also tough to enjoy the trebuchets, sieges, fire, and cemeteries when
all the miscast, messy, mansplaining men are so weak in battle.
Although the opening scenes suggest a mystical connection, there is
no point to these separate stories being told in parallel. Neither
receives the attention it deserves, leaving the medieval hollow
despite serious topics and the present lacking an intelligent mystery
that doesn't know its audience. While the men in such adventures can
handle the Holy Grail, reincarnation, immortality, and
get the girl; with women the medieval must be all jealous affairs and
a soap opera sappy choice between a lover or
the greatest religious and archaeology discovery ever. Boo!
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