MLSF Review

What's that twinkling in the gloaming?  Ah, it's a bevy of clichés in this twee drama, set in 1930s Scotland (the green green Highlands, the fine costumes, the caramel accents!) and based on the autobiography of a chap who went on to become a top British TV executive.  "Wasn't Pa*pahhh* extraordinary!" seems to be the point of this memoir, told by an observant son (Robert Norman), but we're offered no proof.  Dad (Colin Firth) is apparently eccentric because he fancies sphagnum moss as a profitable crop.  He also fancies his brother-in-law's fiancée (Irene Jacob), while Ma*mahhh* (MEM) suffers quietly.  The family matriarch (RH) sniffs with disapproval as a matter of course.  Hugh Hudson directs as if time has stood still since Chariots of Fire.  Grade:  C.

BEAUTIFUL DREAMERS
My Life So Far--Starring Colin Firth

If your vacation plans are less than postcard-worthy, this gorgeous movie
may be your ticket.  Set in a picturesque Highland castle in 1930s Scotland,
it's the story of the MacIntosh family as seen through the eyes of ten-year-old Fraser.  His father (Firth) is an inventor, but with less-than-astute business skills.  the family's idyllic life is threatened when Fraser's successful uncle (Malcolm McDowell) returns for a visit with his fiancée (Irene Jacob), with whom his father has fallen in love.

Although the plot unwinds clumsily, see it for the charming glimpse it offers of manor life. (3 stars out of 4)

So how does British actor Colin Firth, who costars with Mary Elizabeth
Mastrantonio and Malcolm McDowell in the new My Life So Far  feel about
his career so far? "At any point in an actor's life, to have made a
genuine impact is something be cherished," says Firth, 38, who captured
American audiences as Mr. Darcy in the 1996 A&E miniseries Pride and
Prejudice. "But I get the jitters if too much attention is focused on me."
Not that Firth is complaining. As a kid, he recalls, "I remember watching
a crowd scene on television, and mom said,' See all those people walking
up and down the street? They're actors.  Do you want to do that? Because
that's what most actors do.  You've got two people doing dialogue and 200
people walking in the back.' [Being an extra] certainly wasn't my ambition."

MY LIFE SO FAR
Directed by Hugh Hudson

Is it gently celebrating eccentricity or mildly deploring familial dysfunction?  This story, told by a 10-year-old boy growing up in a Scottish castle in the 1920s, can't quite make up its mind on that matter.  Or what it thinks of its central figure, Edward (Colin Firth), an impractical inventor trying to make a go of moss farming.  He is at once lustful (his determined eye is cast at his brother-in-law's pretty French fiancée), a good father to his numerous brood, yet sometimes abrupt and heedless of them.  He's a stormy character, all right, but an unfocused one, and this well-cast adaptation of a memoir by a British TV executive is disjointed, only queasily humorous and too casual about its dark undercurrents.
--By Richard Schickel

(Big Issue is available on the streets. Its part of a project to give homeless jobs)
 

The festive season has seen several adaptations of famous nineteen-century novels do battle on our screens. . . Tonight it's the second part of 'David Copperfield' on BBC1, followed by a two-hour version of Henry James' 1898 ghost story 'The Turn of the Screw', adapted by Nick Dear.

Unfortunately, as  is often the case with this one, a classic novel does not necessarily
result  in a classic piece of TV drama.

Jodhi May plays the Governess, sent to a country house to look after the  niece and nephew of a Lond gent she refers to as the Master (Colin Firth) during the summer. While going about her duties the nameless Governess is spooked by ghostly apparitions and the strange behavior of the seemingly innocent children, Miles and Flora.

It's a bizarre tale that is not particularly easy to get a handle on even in the book, so it will be confusing to the average viewer who tunes in without being familiar with Henry James' work. Sexual tension between the Governess and the Master is hinted at in the opening scene, yet this is then virually ignored. Her increasingly unhinged behaviour seems absurdly melodramatic. The background to her character and the motivations for her behavior are thin on the ground, and Jodhi May is not a good enough actress to suggest any. Ultimately her blank bewilderment becomes increasingly irritating. 

Oh, and Darcy fans: If ITV's marketing has prompted you to tune in in anticipation of a hefty dose of Colin Firth, you will be disappointed. He's on screen for a grand total of five minutes. Better to wait for the movie version, 'The Innocents. at 1:35 on C4.

Tom Howard