Over the weekend, I watched the movie version of Mrs. Dalloway to see how it compared to the novel. Overall I thought it followed the novel very closely as far as plotline and dialogue. However the main, very big, difference was the loss of the characters’ thoughts. This was what, I thought, made the book unique. While we are able to hear some of Clarissa’s thoughts through Vanessa Redgrave’s narration, much is lost. For example, a big portion of the novel discusses Clarissa’s hatred towards Miss Killman, but in the movie we don’t get any sense of how Clarissa feels. Another example is when Richard is getting the flowers for Clarissa; we don’t know that he is getting them to show her that he loves her, because we don’t hear what he’s thinking. One clever way of replacing the loss of thoughts was by showing it through flashbacks. In the movie, Clarissa hardly narrates about Sally. Instead, we learn everything we know about Sally through flashbacks of a young Sally and Clarissa.
Some of the younger versions of the characters were sometimes distractingly different looking from the older versions and some of the casting, I thought, was completely wrong. What I got from the novel was that Peter Walsh was supposed to be very handsome and charming, but in the movie, neither the younger Peter nor the old Peter was either of these. I think Clarissa, played by Vanessa Redgrave, was too old for this role and she didn’t have enough energy or show enough enthusiasm for this character. One character that I thought was perfectly cast was Septimus . Although we couldn’t hear what he was thinking, there were many references to Evans and anytime Septimus was thinking about the war, we could hear the sound of bombs exploding and people shouting, as if we were in the midst of a battle. However, he also did a great job of showing what a wonderful man he used to be before the war. The woman who played Rezia was also very well cast. She very accurately portrayed Lucrezia’s innocence and the way she was shut out from society.
These are just a few of my thoughts comparing the two and if I had to choose, I definitely like the book better!
1 comment:
I agree: _Mrs. Dalloway_ to me is the definition of an "unfilmable" novel, but the film does have some compelling performances. It works well, I think, as a *companion* to the novel, a particular interpretation. But I can't imagine *only* watching the film--so much of the story only takes place on the inside. But the film, through editing, is able to nicely capture the movement from past to present and back again; we see "both" Clarissas side by side.
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