THE BURDEN OF "THE GO-BETWEEN"

I’m looking back on our progress so far, and am noticing that it’s been a while since we’ve had a good old period piece on these pages. Period pieces are just one of those things aren’t they, you either love them or you hate them. Thing is, they tend to be a little… I don’t know, samey. They are usually grand romances; often depict historical events and the accent is largely on the costumes and décor. Very rarely, however, you get a psychological period piece. This rarity is quite odd, because no matter what else was different, the way people’s minds worked were the same. And there were then as there are now, people who had figured out how people’s minds worked, and how to use this fact… This is what The Go-between is precisely all about…
The year is 1900. Young Leo, a twelve year-old boy from an underprivileged family, is spending ten days of the summer vacation in Norfolk, at the grand home of his richer classmate and friend Marcus. Leo has been brought up by his widowed mother with great difficulty and therefore is stunned by the luxury in the Norfolk home. But he is even more stunned by Clarissa (Julie Christie), Marcus’s beautiful older sister. Leo knows very little of the more “sensitive” issues in life, Clarissa is quick to pick up on this and even quicker to use it to her own advantage. This is because Clarissa, though engaged to be married, is having an affair with one of the tenant farmers on the estate. Of course their difference in statute makes an open affair virtually impossible, but at least now Leo is here, they can meet more often. This is brought about by the fact that Leo would do virtually anything for Clarissa. Including playing postman between the two lovers, ferrying their notes back and forth… How long will Clarissa be able to keep this game up? When, if ever will Leo’s eyes open to what it is he is actually doing?
The film shows us an absolutely marvelous example of manipulation. Leo is a typical “ingénue” if there ever was one. In this age of information and the internet, with children playing with intelligent phones from toddlerhood upwards, it is very hard to actually imagine someone like Leo. At twelve, children these days are completely in touch with every last intricacy of the “facts of life” and everything that goes with them. Leo, however, is made blissful just by the knowledge that he is making Clarissa happy. What is actually in these notes and what is happening behind everybody’s backs is way beyond his imagination. We watch on with baited breath and fraying nerves as the plot thickens… Will Leo actually ever truly “get” what is going on?
Losey uses camerawork to underline this feeling even further. The camera is very “stiff”, not a lot of movement, definitely not a lot of zooming, just some gentle panning here and there. The framing is meticulous, often quite beautiful with great attention to detail. The effect is very much that of British society at the turn of the century; rigid, distant with great attention to exterior fanfare. That, in turn, makes us feel just as trapped as Leo is, trapped on the surface of events if you will, with the rules of the adults giving him very little room to manoeuver and seek the information he clearly knows he lacks. In short The Go-between is elegant, intelligent and definitely original as far as period films go. If you’re only going to watch one, make it this one…

THE RUSSIAN REVOLUTION AND "DR ZHIVAGO"

The moment I wrote the title for this one I heard the rustle of romantics everywhere reaching for their Kleenex. The epic love story of Dr. Yuri Zhivago and his Lara has now its own place among the literature’s truly great love affairs. But as famous as Boris Pasternak’s novel – and maybe even more so – is the MGM epic, one of the last great epics ever made, starring Omar Sheriff and Julie Christie. Emotions run so high and so much is at stake in this great adventure that even at three hours long the film seems to fly by… If we haven’t drowned in our own tears by the end like in Alice in Wonderland that is… =)
Dr Yuri Andreyevich Zhivago (played by Omar Sheriff – and ladies, you have to admit… he WAS a stunner in the true sense of the word…) is an orphan, brought up by family friends at the beginning of the 20th century. He is an idealistic young man with a warm heart and devoted to his trade, curing people. As they have grown love has blossomed between him and his adoptive sister Tonya (Geraldine Chaplin who I also admire greatly). Life seems to be treating him pretty well until the First World War and then the Russian Revolution changes their lives forever. Fate brings him together with Larissa on the front; he is a doctor and Larissa is a nurse. They are not complete strangers, their paths have briefly crossed before; but they are both married now and have young children. Even so, the bond between them is so strong that love blossoms despite their best efforts. But quite apart from the fact that they are both married the Revolution has changed their lives back home forever. Soon survival itself will become a serious issue, but is love stronger than this? More importantly will it support the two of them until better times when they can be together?
Of course this is one of the great epic love stories of the 20th century, of course Omar Sheriff with his legendary, shining eyes and expressive face coupled with the demure beauty of Julie Christie make for one of the most successful couples on screen but believe me when I tell you I have put this film in the “civil war films week” for a reason. The beauty of the film lays mainly in the fact that director David Lean has struck a great balance between the main love story and the effects of the civil war raging around them. For example, I was remarking to my mother that only in films of yore would you not be surprised to see that the main protagonists had not even met yet 70 minutes into the film (have a heart, it is 192 minutes in total). In a typical film, in a modern film in fact, the main action would be centered round the couple and all the bits of their lives that didn’t pertain to whether or not their love would survive would be elided or passed over quickly. Here the aim isn’t merely to present a love story. For example, after Yuri and Lara part company at the end of Russia’s involvement in the First World War, we follow Yuri back to Moscow. We see how life has changed there, how his wife and elderly father are surviving with the greatest difficulty and watch Yuri try to adapt to the new life. Of course the new life under Soviet rule was by no means easy; apart from the strictness, the censure on pretty much everything (stretching even to Yuri’s poems) famine and disease was everywhere, a fact we can witness thanks to Yuri’s job as a doctor. One could argue that these discomforts perpetrate Yuri and Lara coming back together again, but my point is that they could have been portrayed in a much more concise manner. Instead, David Lean (and Boris Pasternak) take the time to show us what life in the Soviet Union immediately after the revolution was like… The tragedy of Lara and Yuri is that they dream of building a new life together that would mean destroying their previous lives. This would have been difficult at best, but the new regime in Russia means their old lives are being destroyed anyway, and they are being destroyed in such a way that things may end up actually and physically destroying them and their loved ones. It is this pathos that makes Dr. Zhivago such a great story AND such a great love story…
Unmissable on many counts I’d say…