The 2008 film Brideshead Revisited is a huge disappointment for fans of the 1981 series as Evelyn Waugh’s novel is condensed into a two-hour film.
The story is very disjointed, as it begins with Charles [Matthew Goode] during the war prior to the opening credits.
It flashes back to an ocean voyage several years earlier when Charles is reunited with Julia Flyte [Hayley Atwell]. He is a successful British artist who has, to use a clique, “taken New York by storm”!
Oxford University
Middle-class Charles aspires to become an artist and studies history at Oxford. He meets the charming but decadent Lord Sebastian Flyte [Ben Whishaw] who throws up in his rooms and is introduced into the exclusive world of British high society involving money, glamour and outrageous behaviour.
The movie harks back to nostalgia of the golden age of the 1920s before the English nobility became a dying breed—the atmosphere of a better age. Yet the Flyte family are flawed despite their wealth and privileged lives.
Charles visits Brideshead, the ancestral family home, and he is entranced by its grandeur. He eventually meets other family members, including Lady Marchmain [Emma Thompson] and her other children: Bridey [Ed Stoppard], Julia and Cordelia [Felicity Jones].
Catholic Family
Catholic themes of divine grace and reconciliation prevail but there is no mention of a personal, loving relationship or redemption with one’s Lord and Saviour.
Lady Marchmain is pathologically devoted to Catholicism which affects her family. (Lord Marchmain [Michael Gambon] deserted his family to live with his mistress Cara [Greta Scacchi] in Venice to escape after he converted to marry his wife.)
Bridey is cold, aloof and insensitive. He refuses to introduce his fiancée to Julia and Charles because they are “living in sin”.
Julia marries Rex Mottram [Jonathan Cake] rather than Charles because he is Catholic and her mother approves. Julia realises she made a mistake.
Lady Marchmain’s attempts to stop Sebastian’s drinking only worsen the problem. Mr Samgrass [James Bradshaw] spies on Sebastian at Oxford and she insists Charles accompanies him to Venice, believing he would be a good influence.
Actually, Sebastian’s sexual preference and his full relationship with Charles were ambiguous in both the novel and the 1981 TV series.
Screenwriters Jeremy Brock and Andrew Davies felt contemporary 21st Century audiences were less likely to be shocked than Waugh’s 1945 readers or early 1980s television audiences, but, these days, most believe it is so passé.
Brideshead Revisited was filmed at Castle Howard in Yorkshire, and in London, Oxford, Venice and Morocco.
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
