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Great Expectations (1998)

The best thing I can say about the 1998 film adaptation of Great Expectations is that it makes me want to revisit the novel. I wonder why my English teacher selected to show us this version in high school. Certainly for the performances. This film makes many grave errors throughout.

Hired by the richest woman in Florida, Mrs. Nora Dinsmoor (Anne Bancroft), to entertain her and her niece Estella, young Finn Bell's knack for illustration captures the attention of the eccentric recluse and falls in love with her niece, Estella. When a now grown Finn (Ethan Hawke) receives money from a mysterious benefactor to put together an art gallery in New York, he discovers Estella (Gwyneth Paltrow) waiting for him there.

This plot's tough film to summarize. It’s about a kid who grows up poor but befriends a crazy rich woman. He falls in love with her nieces, but she pays no attention to him. Years later, he gets an opportunity to win her over. Where did the money she's offering come from? Why is she suddenly reaching out to him? There's romance as he tries to impress his childhood crush (will she reciprocate his feelings?) and drama as Finn begins drifting away from his roots after he finds fortune and fame. There's simultaneously not a whole lot going on and plenty of emotional content. It’s a rise and fall story with some smoochie-smoochie thrown in.

If it feels uneventful, it's because what should be huge time gaps, slow, gradual transformations, and deep characters plots have been trimmed away to make this novel by Charles Dickens fit in a movie. You can sense the gaps and know how they'd be filled but there's still no meat.

Gwyneth Paltrow's character is an emotionless viper so her cold performance is intentional. Why Ethan Hawke is channeling Keanu Reeves from Bram Stoker’s Dracula, I don’t know. There's no chemistry between them which could work on paper but you can never understand why Finn is intoxicated by the thought of Estella except for what must be the most basic of physical lust. Numerous times throughout the film, we see Finn’s artwork as he gets it ready for his gallery. I have to give this picture credit for one thing: in most films, you can tell the actor is simply shading in some black or tracing over the lines that are already there rather than painting/drawing. Here, it looks like Ethan Hawke is producing the pieces. In actuality, they're by Francesco Clemente, whose work is an acquired taste (certainly not for me). The pieces often have their subjects conveniently posed so their hands and feet are out of frame, proportions are all out of whack, the choices of colors are muted - I’d even say uninspired. I don’t sense that this is an intentional commentary on Finn not deserving the fame and success he receives. There's another mistake in the casting: Robert DeNiro as a prisoner Finn meets early in the movie. DeNiro's too big of a name to have a mere cameo and this knowledge ruins surprises later in the story.

This 1998 adaptation of Great Expectations was a mistake. The performance by the lead is flat, the casting ruins the story's twists, and it's all about a romance you won’t care about. (On DVD, August 11, 2016)

Cine: Mucho para ver esta semana Esta semana podés ver la nueva película de Scorsese, El irlandés; el drama Downton Abbey…

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