Word: goneril
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...surely exists in the world. Old age is no guarantee of wisdom or largeness of spirit. But somewhere before a surprise ending with more deaths than Act V of Hamlet, it becomes evident that Author Amis is enjoying his caricatured geriatricks in some way that might be appropriate to Goneril and Regan in King Lear but is simply hateful in Tuppenny-hapenny Cottage. Graham Greene once wrote that when trying to refine the pangs and foibles of men and women into fiction, a novelist must have a sliver of ice in his heart. A sliver of ice, yes. A lump...
...result, Lear's descent into madness after Goneril (Rosalind Cash) and Regan (Ellen Holly) turn him out of the very houses he gave them is distressingly smooth, almost melodramatic. Jones never touches the universal and timeless fears of generational revolt that are implicit in the play. Indeed, much of the time his work seems more elocutionary than emotional. He relies too heavily on wowing the audience with his rich, supple voice...
Vocally, however, she is not strong enough--the same fault she showed here a decade ago when trying the not unsimilar part of Goneril in King Lear. In talking of the murder plot, when Macbeth asks, "If we should fail?," her reply--"We fail?"--lacks the foreceful scorn, the reassuring incredulity needed to prop his weakening resolve. A sensual Lady Macbeth is perfectly valid, but the role requires a decided steak of masculinity, such as captured so imposingly in the portrayals of Dame Judith Anderson, Mrs. Tore Segelcke, and Siobhan McKenna...
Brook is constantly aware of the possibilities in film for more supple dramatic movement, and he is able to use a technique as fundamental as parallel montage to alter completely the dramatic rhythms. A long speech of Goneril's is intercut with shots of Lear riding furiously on the hunt, so that by the time the single speech is finished, the relationship of father and eldest daughter is completely redefined. And when Lear first realizes the emasculating ingratitude of Goneril and Regan ("O, reason not the need!"), Brook moves toward a close-up of the king's eyes that measure...
...action. He incarnates the flame of truth and beauty invested in him by the playwright to be passed on to the audience. Thus one can say that Scofield is perfectly all right as Lear, that MacGowran is a good Fool and that Irene Worth is especially good as Goneril, the oldest and ugliest daughter. Then, too, Alan Webb sensitively portrays the Duke of Gloucester, whose eyes are gouged out with stomach-churning realism. But the instantaneous afterthought is that though these actors have done absolutely superb work onstage, a filmgoer who sees only films would never guess it from this...