On Chesil Beach * * * * 1/2
For those of you that have read the book you already know what a deeply intimate story this is.
It could also be fairly described as a tragedy. I remember reading it several years ago and the sense of frustration and despair I had. I was hoping against hope that it would be okay. "Come on guys, you can fix this. Be patient. You can work this out."
So I was keen to see if, in his screenplay adaptation of his own novel, if Ian Mc Ewan had changed the end: and now that I have seen it I'm not about to tell you.
With Edward and Florence, Ian Mc Ewan gave us a lovely young people and you really want everything to be okay for them, but like Romeo and Juliet you sense that just isn't going to happen.
Like the novel, the film starts at the critical point: the first night of their honeymoon, July 1962. All that brought them to this night is told to us in flashback.
They met at a CND meeting. She is a highly proficient classical musician. He has just graduated in History. But the thing that attracts one to the other is deeper than their intended professions or interests. In fact, on the surface they don't seem to have a lot in common. Yet they feel connected.
In the film this is conveyed convincingly in their language, looks and gestures. Mc Ewan does not use voice over, or their own inner voice. All that we know of them comes through our observation.
Despite their differences their future and happiness seems assured. Florence is quite determined to be a successful classical musician and Edward is fully supporting of her dreams and aspirations. He does not talk much of his own ambitions but she seems to like him for that.
We see their relationship grow quickly and passionately through their student years. We do not see the wedding. The film commences where the book did, on the first night of the honeymoon at an hotel on Chesil Beach, Dorset.
They have been in love for two years, they have shown a hunger for each other, and yet, as many young couples did in those days, they have restrained themselves. But tonight it's just them alone in an hotel room....and a seemingly impossible, heartbreaking, yet totally believable turn in their relationship.
Some people have called it a flat and uneventful film. It certainly didn't come across that way to me. I thought it a great piece of cinema. An extraordinarily intimate observation of a loving relationship. Like the recent Disobedience or like Blue Is The Warmest Colour, I was left thinking of these young people for days afterward, like I had actually come to know them.
Outstanding performances from Billy Howle and Saoirse Ronan, a young actress that just seems to go from strength to strength. It's directed by Dominic Cooke who is primarily a theater director. For this work he was well chosen.
It could also be fairly described as a tragedy. I remember reading it several years ago and the sense of frustration and despair I had. I was hoping against hope that it would be okay. "Come on guys, you can fix this. Be patient. You can work this out."
So I was keen to see if, in his screenplay adaptation of his own novel, if Ian Mc Ewan had changed the end: and now that I have seen it I'm not about to tell you.
With Edward and Florence, Ian Mc Ewan gave us a lovely young people and you really want everything to be okay for them, but like Romeo and Juliet you sense that just isn't going to happen.
Like the novel, the film starts at the critical point: the first night of their honeymoon, July 1962. All that brought them to this night is told to us in flashback.
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| Ed and Flo face the impossible |
In the film this is conveyed convincingly in their language, looks and gestures. Mc Ewan does not use voice over, or their own inner voice. All that we know of them comes through our observation.
Despite their differences their future and happiness seems assured. Florence is quite determined to be a successful classical musician and Edward is fully supporting of her dreams and aspirations. He does not talk much of his own ambitions but she seems to like him for that.
We see their relationship grow quickly and passionately through their student years. We do not see the wedding. The film commences where the book did, on the first night of the honeymoon at an hotel on Chesil Beach, Dorset.
They have been in love for two years, they have shown a hunger for each other, and yet, as many young couples did in those days, they have restrained themselves. But tonight it's just them alone in an hotel room....and a seemingly impossible, heartbreaking, yet totally believable turn in their relationship.
Some people have called it a flat and uneventful film. It certainly didn't come across that way to me. I thought it a great piece of cinema. An extraordinarily intimate observation of a loving relationship. Like the recent Disobedience or like Blue Is The Warmest Colour, I was left thinking of these young people for days afterward, like I had actually come to know them.
Outstanding performances from Billy Howle and Saoirse Ronan, a young actress that just seems to go from strength to strength. It's directed by Dominic Cooke who is primarily a theater director. For this work he was well chosen.
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