By Edward Copeland
The legend has it that David Lean was so scarred by Pauline Kael's brutal take on his 1970 movie Ryan's Daughter that it kept him out of the director's chair for more than a decade, until he returned with 1984's A Passage to India. Alas, Kael's review was not included in her collection For Keeps, so I've never read it in all its glory and her only comment in 5001 Nights at the Movies is that it is "Gush made respectable by millions of dollars tastefully wasted." I don't know if the legend is true, but having recently watched Ryan's Daughter for the first time, I have to think that Kael did Lean and audiences a favor because as he became epic obsessed, his greatness diminished, especially when compared to his earlier, smaller and brilliant films.
Something happens when great filmmakers get the bloat bug and it's a shame that more can't go back to small after they've gone gargantuan (Peter Jackson, I'm looking in your general direction). Don't get me wrong — I love Lawrence of Arabia — but for me, that's the only one of his big pictures that really works (though A Passage to India is passable enough). Even Lawrence lags in the second half, but Bridge on the River Kwai doesn't hold up well and I found Doctor Zhivago damn near interminable aside from Rod Steiger's great performance.
However, I'm here to discuss Ryan's Daughter which is the biggest epic crime committed by Lean — forcing a simple (though dull) tale of a love triangle into a three-hour format because by 1970, that's the only thing he knew how to do. There also is a side diversion into early IRA stuff, but it seems present only to pad out the running time which was padded as it was. Robert Mitchum suffers through a less-than-convincing Irish accent as his new bride (Sarah Miles) suddenly decides to take up with a British soldier, prompting a Scarlet Letter-ish outcry from the townfolk, who also blame her for ratting out an IRA soldier.
As one would expect, the film is pretty — including many shots of raindrops falling off leaves during a love scene that Terrence Malick would love — but pretty images alone do not a good movie make. The real embarrassment of the film is the Oscar-winning performance by John Mills as the village idiot which may well be the worst Oscar-winning performance I've ever seen — and that says a lot. Hidden somewhat beneath makeup, Mills' character basically has two expressions: fear and glee, though I guess you could argue that is one more expression than Charlize Theron could muster under her Monster makeup, thought at least Theron had the help of being able to speak. This all seems so tragic to me when you look back at Lean's early filmography, which holds up so much better than what he made once the epic bug bit him.
1942: Co-directed with Noel Coward, In Which We Serve is a dramatic and touching story of a British naval ship with some haunting images that I don't dare spoil for those who haven't seen it.
1945: Lean produced the fluffy Blithe Spirit, which is worth watching if only for Margaret Rutherford's absolutely brilliant comic performance.
That same year, Lean directed the absolutely sublime romantic classic Brief Encounter whose influence has resonated through the ages in forms as diverse as the play turned movie Same Time, Next Year and the schlock novel turned movie The Bridges of Madison County. It also features great performances by Trevor Howard and the now nearly forgotten Celia Johnson.
1946: Lean made the first of his two great Dickens' adaptations, Great Expectations, and for my money it remains the best film version of a Charles Dickens novel ever put on screen. It also contains a John Mills performance worth praising as Pip. (Mills also gave a memorable early performance in In Which We Serve).
1948: Lean scored another win with Dickens, this time with Oliver Twist. Despite the usual criticism of the Fagin character that accompanies all versions of this tale, Alec Guinness is positively brilliant in the role.
Admittedly, I haven't seen his works between 1949 and 1954, but in 1955 he made the bittersweet Summertime with Katharine Hepburn as a spinster finding romance in Venice — and after that, it was epics all the way and I think, aside from Lawrence of Arabia, film lovers are the ones who suffered the most by his conversion to the HUGE. I picked on Peter Jackson earlier about this, but I think it could be applied to Martin Scorsese and others as well. Imagine if Scorsese stepped back from his epic phase and went back to a smaller type of film that made his reputation in the first place. I don't know if The Departed will be that film — but I can hope.
As far as Ryan's Daughter goes, if you haven't seen it, despite the deluxe 2-DVD treatment it has recently received, save your time.
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