RYAN'S DAUGHTER's critical mauling so disenchanted David Lean that he took 14 years to make another feature film - surely time heals everything?
Not really. I have seen worse, but RYAN'S DAUGHTER is a small love story stretched to breaking on Lean's over-sized canvas.
After DOCTOR ZHIVAGO's success, MGM happily financed screenwriter Robert Bolt's take on MADAME BOVARY - need an Irish coastal village? Build one! Irish weather drab? Move filming to South Africa!
What it needs are performances to match the glorious Oscar-winning cinematography by Freddie Young; sadly not with this cast.
Rosy Ryan, bored with village life in County Kerry, marries her former teacher Charles Shaughnessy expecting passion but he is emotionally unexciting.
She finds sexual awakening with a shell-shocked English Major from the local garrison. But it's 1916 and the village supports the IRA.
When their affair is discovered. Rosy and Charles face the villager's fury...
Shelf or charity shop? At the moment it's very touch and go - the unhappy filming seems to have seeped into every sprocket-hole. Robert Mitchum gives a quietly impressive performance as Charles but offscreen he grew to hate Lean's willingness to let his cast sit around while he waited for perfect weather conditions. Sarah Miles - Mrs Robert Bolt at the time - gives a frustratingly thin performance as Rosy; you almost side with the villagers' dislike! The main casting flaw is Christopher Jones as Major Randolph - hilariously, Lean cast him after seeing his previous film only to discover he had been dubbed. Likewise his awful performance here was dubbed during the editing. He and Miles detested each other which does not make for great screen chemistry. The story goes that Jones refused to film the pivitol lovemaking scene with her so Mitchum secretly drugged him making him near-comatose on set. John Mills' Oscar-winning turn as the mute village idiot is now embarrassing to watch with Lean's attempts to give him profundity particularly thick-eared. His winning for Best Supporting Actor is all the more annoying given the excellent performances of Trevor Howard as the cantankerous Father Collins and Leo McKern as Rosie's double-agent father. Truth be told, the best performance in the whole film is the wonderful Irish actress Marie Kean as the spiteful town shop-keeper. Despite the critical mauling, the film still made money.
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