Mrs Dalloway by Woolf (Mrs Dalloway (DVD))

Member Name: JB01

Product:	Mrs Dalloway (DVD)
Date:	26/11/06 (103 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Ready for the English customer

Disadvantages: ?

Mrs Dalloway, another adaptation of a Virginia Woolf 1925 novel. Brought to life by the Oscar winning director Antonia’s Line. Released in 1997 this English language film in colour lasts for 93 minutes or at least the free DVD I got from the Daily Mail did. The film is PG (parental guidance) and considered fit for viewing by under 12 year old under parental guidance. The film is set in 1923.

***THE STORY***

The story starts with a scene of war in Italy (1918). It switches to London 1923, Clarrissa Dallaway (Venessa Redgrave) an MP’s wife sets out on a beautiful morning; she's shopping for flowers for her party that evening. On her walk through London she thinks about her past (flashbacks) and her time with her friend Sally. Her life is thrown into crisis when a lover she rejected 30 years ago makes an un expected appearance at her party in her elegant London home. This prompts bittersweet memories (flashbacks). These include scenes of rural England with her friends and her decision to marry one (who made her an MP’s wife) and not the other. Some action also includes Septimus Warren Smith a war victim (WW1) with shell shock. He decides to kill himself. After this the party starts and ends successfully.

***CINEMATIC EXPERIENCE***

CAST includes

Marleen Gorris................Oscar winning director
Vanessa Redrave...........Klarissa Dalloway
Natascha McBhone.........Solaris
Rupert Graves................A film with a view

The periods scenes in England both rural and London are picturesque even beautiful with plenty of period houses and large gardens. The flashbacks work well. The class differences between the domestic staff and upper classes are quite entertaining. The dialogue is an improvement on Orlando (see my previous review) I don’t know whether Woolf planed it this way. The suicide is matter of fact but still quite dramatic. The music is classical for the period but unexceptional, however it does add something to the drama.

***MY OPINION***

I do like to see some of modern English classics writers dramatised for TV and film. It makes the duty of keeping up with developments in English literature some much easier for the couch potatoes like myself. These dramatizations really do work out well; classics like Bronte and Woolf seem to have a style that is well suited for this type of visual drama. The postcard picture backgrounds add a lot to the author’s originals. As I have mentioned the film is very picturesque and as a Londoner I enjoyed this. The scenes in the park earlier on must be from Regents Park. The memories I associate with this and the upper class dwellings make the film more emotional for me and I quite enjoyed the sensation of watching it.

Summary: A modern classic that could have been written for the movies