Word: newland
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...decades-long sojourn in Europe with her husband. The Countess has made a bad marriage and is now returned to the bosoms of her former associates sans Count and hoping to divorce, which casts her as a fallen woman in the eyes of this morally puritanical--though decadent--crowd. Newland Archer (played by a stalwart yet at times wistful Daniel Day-Lewis), the intellectually curious scion of a respected family, is one of the few willing to give her the benefit of the doubt...
Predictably enough, Newland ends up giving the liberal countess a lot more than just the benefit of the doubt. Unfortunately, he's engaged--and to Winona Ryder, no less! Winona plays the idiotic but socially savvy May Welland (a huge come-down from her kicky roles in "Heathers," "Beetle-juice," and "Edward Scissorshands...
...story line, and might have lent itself to lots of exciting intrigue and seduction a la "Dangerous Liaisons." Martin is trying hard to make a respectable and literary film, but the result is too plodding to sustain any dramatic tension. The denouement is obvious from the first scenes, when Newland sees the Countess at the opera. The Countess reminds Newland that as a child he had tried to kiss her behind a door: more kisses to come, one understands. Then at the post-opera ball Newland hurries to announce his engagement to May, so as to detract attention from...
...Pfeiffer so elegant and bruised, Ryder a young Audrey Hepburn in all her wide-eyed guile) are swathed in glamorous costumes and period decor. The congestion of old masters on a matron's wall suggests the confined space in which the story unfolds and the straitened notions to which Newland and Ellen must pay homage. The handsomely fussy design is meant to dazzle and deaden the viewer's senses -- as Newland is seduced by Ellen and suffocated...
...story is finally May's triumph, Ellen's rue, Newland's muted ruin. For him it is a tragedy, because he has been made aware of joys anticipated, delayed, crushed. Frequently he rewrites the tryst in his mind: one moment when Ellen might have caressed him, another when she could have turned around, smiled and changed his life...