"You See Monsieur, It's Worth Everything, Isn't It, To Keep One's Intellectual Liberty, Not to Enslave One's Powers Of Appreciation, One's Critical Independence?"

We finally watched the film version of The Age of Innocence last night. It took me a while to get my hands on it, largely because I am an On Demand whore, and if the movie is not immediately available at my fingertips, I get ornery and a bit of anxiety. And I don't have Netflix, so the mister had to get it for us to watch.

And let me just say, this was an absolutely gorgeous and very faithful retelling of the book. Go figure that it was Scorcese. One of the biggest things that Edith Wharton did magnificently well in the book was the translation of the things that were valued by those in the wealthy echelon that the story centers around - particularly home interiors, furniture, food, and clothing. And all of these things were so opulently displayed in the movie - while watching it I was hoping that the costume and set designers received Academy Awards for their work, (only 1 of these turned out to be true). It's one thing to imagine in your mind that kind of extravagance and that kind of detail while you're reading a book, and another thing entirely to see it translated in even more detail that your imagination could have summoned. So that visual part of the film was done to perfection.

And the acting and translation of the story was very faithful too. The love affair between Newland and Madame Olenska is much more overt in the movie (it felt a little more reserved in the book), and the book certainly captured Newland's frustration with having to be tied to societal norms (while also revering them) more than the movie, but I think the gist of it was there. There were times while watching the movie that I think, if you hadn't read the book, you would have been thoroughly confused (characters and events that were squished into the movie without the sufficient explanation), but overall, it was a very fair representation.

So overall, I really really liked it. It's the kind of movie that I wish I was able to watch on a regular basis. Like if it was on tv and I happened across it, chances are I would stay there and watch the entire thing until it was done.

I'm plugging away on Rebecca (100+ pages down) and am already looking forward to watching the movie. Hitchcock here I come.

Happy Sunday!