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Crimson Peak (2015)
Finally got round to watching "Crimson Peak", a film which I remember as having sounded promising before release and then receiving generally dismissive reviews.
It's certainly got some dubious plot-holes (Edith running round on a supposedly broken leg for most of the last act, for one thing; and it's hard to create a convincing vacuum inside a house by shutting the windows tightly when there is snow falling through a hole in the roof! Why does the portrait of Thomas's mother show her as an old woman if Thomas was only twelve when she died? Why would anyone make and save all those cylinder recordings? How can Edith's banker father still have rough hands, when he hasn't been a steelworker for decades?) And the film's idea of northern England has more in common with backwoods Canada than Cumbria, especially the 'post office' which appears to be a log cabin (and allegedly hires out horses).
But it managed to get me emotionally for all that. Especially the "you're a doctor, tell me where" line, which appears to have one heart-wrenching implication and then subsequently turns out to have another...
The film pulls off the trick of making you understand and semi-sympathise with the antagonists after -- even after -- learning what they have done: Lucille with her terror of being shut away alone, Thomas who has been both shielded by her and destroyed by her. (Or maybe it's just the age-old case of Hollywood using 'British' accents with the intention of subliminally signalling effete villainy and triggering subliminal allegiance instead! The wholesome all-American doctor is certainly a cipher.)
A good many aspects of this film are pretty ridiculous, not just in retrospect but while you're actually watching it, alas; a lot of the locations and events seem to be in there with the purpose of looking good rather than of making sense in the context of the surrounding story. The final showdown in particular is all about imagery rather than any kind of common sense (and let's not mention the steam-powered machinery...)
From the spoilers I'd overheard, I'd actually gained the impression that Edith's big discovery is that the siblings and their house already are ghosts, and that she has married into the undead; that might have been a more credible story!
And yet... it does have that emotional kick. The one vital thing is that you should become invested in what becomes of the characters, and I was.
And I like the twist that 'deliberately breaking Edith's heart' turns out to involve telling the aspiring authoress that she clearly doesn't have the faintest idea about writing angst! Nicely balanced later on by the revelations of just how much harm and anguish love can lead to, which is something which at that point she knows nothing about; she is a sheltered innocent and her stories of love's torments almost certainly are rubbish.
It's certainly got some dubious plot-holes (Edith running round on a supposedly broken leg for most of the last act, for one thing; and it's hard to create a convincing vacuum inside a house by shutting the windows tightly when there is snow falling through a hole in the roof! Why does the portrait of Thomas's mother show her as an old woman if Thomas was only twelve when she died? Why would anyone make and save all those cylinder recordings? How can Edith's banker father still have rough hands, when he hasn't been a steelworker for decades?) And the film's idea of northern England has more in common with backwoods Canada than Cumbria, especially the 'post office' which appears to be a log cabin (and allegedly hires out horses).
But it managed to get me emotionally for all that. Especially the "you're a doctor, tell me where" line, which appears to have one heart-wrenching implication and then subsequently turns out to have another...
The film pulls off the trick of making you understand and semi-sympathise with the antagonists after -- even after -- learning what they have done: Lucille with her terror of being shut away alone, Thomas who has been both shielded by her and destroyed by her. (Or maybe it's just the age-old case of Hollywood using 'British' accents with the intention of subliminally signalling effete villainy and triggering subliminal allegiance instead! The wholesome all-American doctor is certainly a cipher.)
A good many aspects of this film are pretty ridiculous, not just in retrospect but while you're actually watching it, alas; a lot of the locations and events seem to be in there with the purpose of looking good rather than of making sense in the context of the surrounding story. The final showdown in particular is all about imagery rather than any kind of common sense (and let's not mention the steam-powered machinery...)
From the spoilers I'd overheard, I'd actually gained the impression that Edith's big discovery is that the siblings and their house already are ghosts, and that she has married into the undead; that might have been a more credible story!
And yet... it does have that emotional kick. The one vital thing is that you should become invested in what becomes of the characters, and I was.
And I like the twist that 'deliberately breaking Edith's heart' turns out to involve telling the aspiring authoress that she clearly doesn't have the faintest idea about writing angst! Nicely balanced later on by the revelations of just how much harm and anguish love can lead to, which is something which at that point she knows nothing about; she is a sheltered innocent and her stories of love's torments almost certainly are rubbish.
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