East of Eden

Character development is set-up in the beginning of this film and brings understanding of both the good and bad sides of the essential characters. I viewed this film during its original airdate and have ever since considered it among my favorite mini-series. Jayne Seymour is fantastic! Bruce Boxleitner and Timothy Bottoms are perfectly cast as brotherly rivals.

I enjoyed the full depiction of John Steinbeck's book. Seymour's performance was flawless and possibly the best she has ever done. She is the only actress who ever made my hair stand on end portraying the scary, evil character of Kathy Ames. This is one of the best mini-series ever made, and the cast of actors perfect for each role.

I have to say that I loved the book and was not impressed by the earlier movie with James Dean because I didn't think it did justice to the storyline of the book.

This miniseries follows the book fairly faithfully, the way it was written. I do seem to remember Sam Hamilton's wife being more fleshed out in the book, though. I also liked the scenery, sets, and other production items of this series.

There were times, though, were the acting made me cringe. For one, when Cathy was being beat up, it was obvious that the fists missed her by a mile. I did think that Soon-Tek Oh did a fantastic job as Lee and Jane Seymour did a great job as Cathy/Kate.

One thing that I felt should be improved is in make-up. They could have done a little more to show the characters aging. For example, they could have at least made Adam's and Kate's hair appear more gray as they aged. Afterall, they were in their sixties at the end of the story. And, they could have done more to Kate's hands to make her arthritis seem more convincing.

We all know the '55 version with James Dean, which is based (loosely) on the epic novel by John Steinbeck. The three major films of James Dean were destined to become cult classics because Dean and his tragic early death lends itself to cultism. But, Dean's East of Eden was Hollywood and hardly Steinbeck. Not to slam it as it was a fine film-- but not Steinbeck. This miniseries utilizing the skills of the Bottoms Brothers and a fine cast-- Jane Seymour is superb. The epic unfolds with the biblical story of betrayal, fratricide, envy and passion found in the book of Genesis. Steinbeck's books in his California period are sweeping epics that cross generations, sprout archetypes and are a wealth of discovery for the reader. Alas, his later works, in comparison, disappoint. But, East of Eden, which with its classic epic mate, The Grapes of Wrath, bring to light a struggle and conflict inherent in the human condition. This is no slight challenge to bring to the screen and it takes the length of a mini-series to do it justice. The saga of the Trask family becomes not only the tale of the fall from grace we all know from our Judeo-Christian tradition but the conflict that is part of all of us. Wrought with deceit, pain, misunderstanding and misjudgement, it is a tale of redemption, forgiving and hope. This is one of the best mini-series I've ever come across and for one that hates TV to sit with eyes glued to the screen from beginning to conclusion, it had to be good. Alas, no video or DVD. Watch for it on reruns.

Jane Seymour's absolutely astounding performance is reason enough to watch this all the way through. She is by turns kittenish, sweet, ruthless, self-serving, tormented and tormentor often just flat out evil but always watchable. She is able by small gestures to show Cathy/Kate's internal struggle, at first, wishing to be good but unable to accomplish that since something inside her is intrinsically rotten and finally surrendering her soul to pure villainy. She's a wonder, unfortunately she has not been presented with the opportunity to play this sort of full bodied character since. As for the rest of the show Lloyd Bridges almost matches Jane's work in one of his best latter day portrayals as the stern level headed Samuel. Their shared scene where Cathy is in labor is some of the best acting you will ever see in a miniseries. Soon Tek-Oh is fine as the faithful Lee and Bruce Boxleitner does some good work as the deeply flawed Charles. There are also some nice contributions in smaller roles by fine actors like Howard Duff as the cuckold whore-monger and Anne Baxter, full of brio as the madame Faye. The true weakness of the piece, and it is a big one, is the borderline terrible performance by Timothy Bottoms as Adam. While Cathy/Kate was always the strongest character of the book Adam is its focal point and to have the at best middling Bottoms in the part hurts the story as the stronger actors all but erase him from the screen whenever he shares scenes with them. The second portion is hampered in the same way by Sam Bottoms, although he is better than brother Timothy, and the fact that both he and Hart Bochner plus Karen Allen as Abra are too old for their roles. Still the Cain vs. Abel story at its center is strong enough to hold your interest and Jane's master class in acting compelling. While the James Dean version is also a superior picture with great acting from Julie Harris, Raymond Massey, Jo Van Fleet and him it only covers the second part of the book, for a full rendering of the novel this is about as close to perfect as you are likely to see. Once again Jane is great here, she won many well deserved awards for her work, don't miss it.