Jane Eyre and Timothy Dalton...

[fajrdrako]

Back on April 8, I saw the new 2011 movie version of Jane Eyre, starring Mia Wasikowska and Michael Fassbender. That got me thinking about my favourite version of Jane Eyre, the 1983 BBC mini-series starring Zelah Clarke and Timothy Dalton.

Have I mentioned that it's one of my favourite books?

So today I held a video-party and watched all 8 episodes of the mini-series all at once, with gamergrrl, Beulah, and Tasia. Once again, I loved it. The 2011 version is in some ways a better show - beautifully adapted - but I like the actors better in the 1983 version, especially Timothy Dalton as Rochester. No, he doesn't look like Rochester. He doesn't need to. He acts the part so well he is Rochester, and I've never thought that of any other filmed version.



Specific comments:

1. Zelah Clarke is charming, and beautiful - yet not so classically beautiful that she seems totally wrong as Jane.
   
   
2. Timothy Dalton is not only stunningly gorgeous, he's hot. I'd forgotten how sexy he can be. And his passionate aura is all the stronger for having the backdrop of Victorian repression. In several scenes he took my breath away. What an actor.
   
   
3. Jane Eyre is supposed to be really small. Zelah Clarke must be. Everyone towered over her, not just Rochester.
   
   
4. I feel sorry for Adèle. She wants to sing and dance and perform and the adults always make her sit still and be quiet. It's the Victorian style of child-raising.
   
   
5. Lowood Institution seems much more benign than in the book.
   
   
6. They left out the scene of Helen Burns' dying while Jane was in her bed. Why? It's such a strong scene. I thought Colette Barker, who played Helen, extremely beautiful.
   
   
7. Miss Temple had rather elegant, even luxurious rooms, for a pool schoolteacher in a charity institution.
   
   
8. I thought Thornfield was likely upscale and far too palatial, but I see in the book that it is described as having battlements. So it really must be fairly impressive.
   
   
9. The guy who plays Richard Mason, Damien Thomas, looks familiar. Probably from The Professionals, as he was in the episode "Heroes".
   
   
10. St. John Rivers is played by Andrew Bicknell, surprisingly good looking for a priggish missionary - but it occurred to me that he has the looks to play Lymond:
    
    
    
    He didn't look familiar to me, but I see he's had pretty steady work through the years, including a role in Highlander.
    
    
11. Sian Pattenden, who played Jane as a child, was in Doctor Who at about the same time she made this movie. In fact, a number of the actors were also on Doctor Who, including, of course, Timothy Dalton.
    
    
12. It embarrasses me a little how I can recite the dialogue along with the actors. And then notice when lines are cut or words changed. It's like Shakespeare that way.
    
    
13. When they mentioned the drink negus - essentially, mulled port - I looked it up. It was drink created by and named after a man named Negus in the 18th century, but what amused me is that Wikipedia mentions that Charlotte Bronte mentions it in Jane Eyre. Small world, thought I. It's also mentioned in Austin and Dickens. I wonder if commodorified has tried it; she likes port.
    
    
14. Some of the invented scenes worked better than others. Some seemed like padding, but in general the pacing of the series was very good - cliffhangers at the end of each one.
    
    
15. I see there are many versions of Jane Eyre I have not seen. Must watch them all.
    

Comments

[baronjanus]

I have a started Buffy crossover with the Dalton version. It was a cool idea, but I never finished it, sigh.

[fajrdrako]

Now, that sounds like fun! Do you still have whatever it was you wrote?

[baronjanus]

I searched and searched :( and did not find. It has to be *somewhere*.

[fajrdrako]

I hope it turns up. Too good to lose.

[baronjanus]

Heh, I'm not sure the actual product was good at all, which is why it was never finished or posted. The idea is still clanking around somewhere in my head, every time Dalton is mentioned, for example.

[fajrdrako]

Well, then - don't let it get away.


I'm now thinking about the lovely young Dalton in "The Lion in Winter" again.

[baronjanus]

Now *that* is a thing that should get written lots. But we've done this particular round of ranting before :)

[fajrdrako]

So we have, and may well do so again. I really should write something...!

[baronjanus]

Want a challenge? Only I got one and I don't plan to actually do it.

[fajrdrako]

Ooh, yes! I love a challenge.

[baronjanus]

"Three times Richard/Philip; once in the woods (that time he talked about), once on plush velvet (in one of the palaces), one author's choice"

[fajrdrako]

No wonder I love your challenges. That is so visually strong. Sensuous, too. I will think about it for a while. If you don't see me post it sometime soon, poke me.

[baronjanus]

Hey, nowhere does it state this has to be sex. It can be a deep, serious conversation about anything in the world.

[fajrdrako]

Oh, yes, I noticed that. We'll see what I do.

[giandujakiss]

I love the Dalton version. And the reason I do is that his Rochester is a lot less scary and mean than others - you can see in his performance that he's sort of putting on a show, and inviting Jane to play with him. Which may not be the "correct" way to do Rochester, but coming to it with modern eyes, it makes their romance much more believable (and palatable).

[fajrdrako]

you can see in his performance that he's sort of putting on a show, and inviting Jane to play with him

Yes, exactly - and that's the way I saw him as being in the book, so it seems perfect to me. I know there are other ways to interpret it, but this is best.

My heart always breaks for Rochester: he's another character I perhaps identify with too much. But it's fun.

[ceruleancat]

This is the only Jane Eyre version I managed to enjoy. I rather like Dalton as Rochester. He has the right look, to my mind (don't know why you think he doesn't). And he manages to express the duality of attitude. He looks like he's playing with her (and with others), enhancing his own dark image and pulling strings, and that's how I see it in the book. It's Jane who's supposed to fall for his displays, not the reader. By which I mean,she's supposed to believe in the image he creates, while the reader is supposed to feel there's something more behind the magician's black cape. As far as I recall, there's repeated hints to Jane being what we used to call an unreliable narrator in lit. crit. (Hebrew terminology in my head. No idea what it's called in English).
I've always imagined Thornfield as a grand old place, not the 19C blocks. I'll take your word for the turrets. That's just the right gothic spice in there, isn't it.

This post reminded me of the only production of Pride and Prejudice that I like (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078672/), which is sadly not standard favorite and therefore unavailable anywhere. Darcy there was perfect in his stiffness and when the mask cracked, it was subtle. And Elizabeth had just the right shade of lively for me. Rest of the cast was also great, as was the adaptation of the text - keeping a lot of the dialogue, and when moving bits about, they fit excellently. I was very disappointed with the later BBC version, it didn't have any of the bite.

[fajrdrako]

I like this one best by far. It's the only one I think gets both Jane and Rochester right. It has its flaws, but they are minor.

He looks like he's playing with her (and with others), enhancing his own dark image and pulling strings, and that's how I see it in the book.

Yes, exactly. He's playful but it's a playfulness that comes from his own inner pain (and salves it) and it's both charming and heartbreaking because he knows, or believes, the joke's on him.

It's Jane who's supposed to fall for his displays, not the reader

Exactly. Jane is baffled, but she loves him, so it doesn't matter. And when she learns his secret, her reaction is pity and despair, not anger. I love the moment when St. John Rivers implies Rochester has a bad character and Jane is furious, because she knows the difference.

gothic spice

A necessary ingredient!

Unsurprisingly, the Pride and Prejudice you cite is my favourite by far - I thought David Rintoul was wonderful in it. I would love to be able to get a copy of that. As it stands, I don't even own a copy of Pride and Prejudice, though I do have Persuasion.