Trying to remember
the past - Dame Judi Dench as Iris Murdoch
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Heart wrenching
movie about the mental and physical decline of the novelist Iris
Murdoch.
Nigel
Bell
91热爆 Films returns with a major success following the international
acclaim received by Billy
Elliot (the Corporation seems to have brushed last year's
release Born
Romantic under the carpet!)
The Plot
The film depicts the final years of the life of celebrated novelist
Iris Murdoch from the days just before she realises she has Alzheimer's
disease.
These images
mix with those from her college years at Oxford when she first met
future husband John Bayley, the man whose memoirs were the basis
of the film.
The Verdict
Iris is certainly a brave film. It's hard to see a big
Hollywood movie company tackling an issue like Alzheimer's, especially
when there's no miracle cure, no happy ending.
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| Kate Winslet
as the young Iris |
This is not
a film for the feint hearted. In the week another British movie,
horror flick Long
Time Dead, is released, this is easily the scarier.
The reason -
here is a real disease which can affect anyone at anytime without
warning. Iris is fact not fiction.
Aficionados
of Iris Murdoch might be disappointed. This is not a documentary
on the novelist. You learn little about what made her tick other
than she had a passion for words, was apt to go skinny dipping and
enjoyed casual flings.
Indeed Iris
could be anyone in the world who finds their life shattered by the
disease.
And because
most people know the story before they go to the cinema there's
tension right from the start.
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| Jim Broadbent
as John Bayley brings the shopping |
You're just
waiting for those tell tale signs of Alzheimer's setting in.
When she's giving
lectures you're hoping she won't forget what she wants to say. When
she finally does lose her way it's almost a relief, but then the
heartache continues as her life (and that of husband John) rapidly
collapses.
No punches are
pulled. When John Bayley tells the specialists his wife will fight
the disease he's bluntly told she won't win.
The performances
Much has been said about the portrayal of young and old Iris
by Kate Winslet and Judi Dench. The plaudits are well deserved,
especially Dench who must take a woman from the heights of academia
to the base of incontinence.
But the contribution
of Hugh Bonneville and Jim Broadbent as young and old John Bayley
must not be overlooked.
Broadbent especially
must be applauded. If Dench is up for honours, he should be to.
When you consider the difference between this character and that
of Harold Zidler in Moulin
Rouge, Broadbent clearly deserves greater recognition.
A brave film
then and one which could be a lesson to us all since the chances
are we'll all come across someone, or someone who know someone with
Alzheimer's, in the years ahead.
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