Fortunes of War

It is always difficult to judge a movie based upon a book without passing judgment on what it manages to retain and what it (un)intentionally leaves behind. Olivia Manning's books used to be banned in Romania during the communist régime, and that is probably the reason why this TV series has been shot in some locations in Yugoslavia at the time of its production (1986 - 1987). I find the acting excellent, and the atmosphere filled with nostalgia. Nevertheless, given the fact that the producers have included various black-and-white excerpts from WWII documentaries, I find it inexcusable that they haven't also included vintage images of Bucharest in the 1940's, and especially of the Athénée Palace Hotel. Using some lugubrious Ljubliana building as a stand-in is very hard to swallow, especially for someone very well acquainted with the splendours of interbellum Bucharest. The same could have been done about the Royal Palace. And this would have hardly increased the costs. Apart from that, I find this worth watching and re-watching. As one grows older, one sees things differently.

I don't know where I was when this first came out on PBS or BBC, but I know where I was when we rented it and watched it recently. Riveted and delighted. I award Fortunes of War a 9.5, from the marvelous real world settings to the splendid acting by every member of this incredible ensemble...and the story is simply superb. I didn't give it a 10 because I can't think of a 10 film at the moment with which to even compare. Enough superlatives. Watch it and be entertained and enlightened. Kenneth and Emma are joys to behold, the predicaments and conflicts totally believable, the insidious creep of Nazi Europe frightening, the subsequent war scenes thankfully subdued but still realistic. Rent it, own it, view it. Again and again.

I've just watched Fortunes of War again after a 17 year gap and it is every bit as good as I remember it.

The fact that Branagh and Thompson's marriage fell apart in the 1990s adds poignancy to their acting of marital tensions here.

Much of the drama revolves around Harriet's struggle to get Guy to "see" her as a person in her own right, although Branagh's portrayal of Guy's grief is the emotional high point.

Two supporting roles deserve a special mention - Ronald Pickup as the (ultimately) lovable aristocratic rogue Prince Yakimov, and Alan Bennett as the blinkered, snobbish and self-important Lord Pinkrose. Thank God we were spared more than the first five words of his lecture!

Even the small roles (e.g. Simon's army physiotherapist) are beautifully played.

The camera work is also wonderful - particularly the final shot.

The only drawback of seeing it on video, as opposed to the original TV episodes, is that the haunting theme tune is only heard right at the end of the film.

I enjoyed the book so much that I bought the movie and sat through hours of it. Best part for me was Egypt. Ronald Pickup was superb as Yakimov. I look forward to reading all of it again.

Discerning Northern Irish actor Kenneth Branagh and the beautiful, brilliant Emma Thompson met and presumably fell in love here, as they play bohemian British newlyweds Guy and Harriet Pringle who arrive in Bucharest, as does the slothful, flat broke Prince Yakimov, who takes up an ad hoc job as a photojournalist of sorts on a British paper to save himself from total indigence. Harriet is introduced to her fellow expatriates, but their happy life is disjoined by the assassination of Romania's prime minister and Nazi Germany's invasion of Poland. Gossip murmurs of a German invasion of Romania and Guy, mentally consumed all the same in his work and arranging civil occasions, is gaulled by his Communism (no pun intended) to take peripheral measures to take care of the family of a Jewish student of his from the anti-Semitic Romanian regime. Although this premise sounds as if it gains momentum and grows more and more exciting, it decidedly does not.

Almost reminiscent of the Jean Renoir film Grand Illusion, Fortunes of War shows a group of people segueing through meetings with different cultures, a war raging on around them but not bothering them any more than some other long-term struggle. But unlike Grand Illusion, the conflicts between the characters are unrelated to the war. It is only one of the dominoes that instigates the many things they do, mainly because they, calm and collected, take refuge in their culture, which remains impervious to the effects all the other ones seem to try to impose upon them through each of these seven one-hour episodes. We watch Guy's lofty devotion to make a difference and boost morale from within. Histrionics mature, decelerate or sustain between the couple and those who come and go from their lives, and we start to care about most of them. With this apposing of following the Pringles subjectively and impartially observing their affiliates, we see how fearful daily life could be with the consistent foreboding of war, but how it isn't. We contemplate Guy with his wife as he preoccupies himself with good intentions towards so many, yet at her exasperated cost, and we want to rattle him out of his cerebrum for a breather in her heart.

In seven hours, the story goes through no significant mood swings, nor any real climax, even in the final episode. But that's just how all of its characters feel about it. Life just goes on, and on and on. Characters latch on, decisions are made, people come and go. My favorite part is when Pinkrose finally gets to give his lecture on Lord Byron.