I bostoniani

A beautiful complex film. In this story love and politics collide here. The story centres around a young woman who becomes involved in speaking out on behalf of women's rights during the close of the 19th century America. The cause is one in which she's encouraged to give her all, it's intensity at times feels almost cult like with the leader demand complete loyalty. In fact so strong is the depth of feeling though that you are left to wonder is this purely a platonic friendship or is there something else going on? The young lady though is highly sought after for her charm and intelligence, one suitor a southern US Civil War veteran with opposite views on the place of men and women in life seeks to win her over, and they are mutually attracted to each other despite their different outlooks on politics.

The film has a lovely so burning beauty, with lovely attention played it's camerawork, costumes and production design. This is largely a story about confused feelings and characters struggling to admit their true feelings to themselves.

Henry James has not been an easy author to bring to the screen. The Heiress has been one glorious exception and even with the fine production values that Merchant/Ivory brought to The Bostonians it still doesn't quite measure up to The Heiress in glorious black and white.

That being said The Bostonians is great window on the world of Henry James and the upper class society in which he moved in New York and Boston. James was a great evaluator of human nature even of the love that dare not speak its name.

Stripped of all the trimmings about the emerging women's movement what we've got here is a triangle with a lesbian twist. Vanessa Redgrave got an Oscar nomination for Best Actress with her portrayal as an intellectual leader who feels she hasn't the voice to articulate the issues surrounding suffrage and all the other inequalities women endured back then. She latches on to a protégé in the person of Madeline Potter recently shilling for her faith healer father Wesley Addy. What she cannot, dare not articulate is the physical attraction she's feeling for Potter.

Redgrave is simply marvelous as the frustrated, possibly even latent lesbian. We're never sure if she has or will ever consummate her feelings. This is Boston of the 1870s-1880s where such things are frowned there even more than most places in the USA.

Vanessa's rival for Potter is Christopher Reeve a devilishly handsome young blade from the south who has come north to seek his fortune as a lawyer. As for Potter she's not sure of what she wants or even that Redgrave's interest in her is more than politics.

Linda Hunt and Jessica Tandy have a pair of good roles, The Bostonians is great in terms of roles for women. Tandy is an aged old soul who rejoices in the changes in America she's seen in the 19th century of which she remembers most of. Hunt is her nurse/companion who is a shrewd observer of the events around her and Tandy.

The Bostonians also got a nomination for Costume Design and the shooting in Boston and New York are fine. Boston has kept a lot of the same look Henry James knew in certain areas of the city and James Ivory made great use of Central Park in New York and some of the structures there that were put up in the time of Henry James.

I won't say what happens other than to say that Vanessa Redgrave does find it in herself to articulate her cause. As for the rest you have to watch this very fine production to find out.

I've always been interested in the James adaptations,and in the Ivory films.

The Bostonians ' first half's calligraphy and distinguished Callophily is pleasing,then the groundless length becomes oppressive,annoying and exasperating,so that finally I loathed this movie.That's no way to treat the viewers!The unjustified and intolerable length does not serve the narration,not the atmosphere,nor the characters' development. Wasted footage!I began by liking The Bostonians ,I finished by loathing this movie that goes nowhere.(James was quite loquacious and blabbed with a senile joy,and the movie gets also very talkative.)

Reeve smiles intelligently and even ironically from time to time,which kind of contradicts his supposed plainness.He acts somehow beside the point,but I guess the idea of introducing him as a tom cat with transient smiles was meant to cheer a little this overlong H. James adaptation,and as a needed antidote for the crabby Mrs. Redgrave.Reeve is almost brave in feigning some real interest for Madeleine Potter's character.

The two actresses I liked are:(1)Nancy New (as "Olive Chancellor"'s far more attractive sister);(2)Nancy Marchand.

Mrs. Redgrave is a broody,headstrong,crabbed,exalted and poisonous,felonious damsel ,as interesting as Lenin's books.As a matter of fact,this poor woman looks rather feeble-minded.One hopes in vain she'll have her fling with "Verena Tarrant".She is here as cranky as ever.

Mrs. Madeleine Potter is very uninteresting, insipid,and as fascinating as a sausage.

Towards the final of The Bostonians ,I swore at the director, at the scriptwriter and at the entire cast.I would seize Ivory by his ears and force him watch many Bruce Lee movies and many Jackie Chan movies,so much that he gets able to make at least something that well-thought.

The whole plot is utterly nauseating.The characters are as viscid as the mollusks.This makes the movie a morass.This is a show,don't ask me to judge it as if it were a novel.I'm talking about Ivory's show,not about James' novel.The most annoying fact is that Mrs. Redgrave seems to enjoy her role;this is unacceptable!(But it is also obvious that no member of the cast is able to get what this show is about.This may serve,though in a paradoxical way,as a justification for them all!These people (Reeve, Nancy Marchand and Nancy New) performed hoping there is a meaning they are not yet able to comprehend.)

I can't lie, most of this film is pretty boring. The last scene is okay.

Surprised this came out when it did...the ethos seems pretty anti-feminist if you ask me, as the suffergettes are not portrayed in the best light.

You may like this film better than me if you're into costime drama or that period or history or something.

Haven't got anything else to say really. I'm only writing this bit to reach the character limit. Probably won't re-watch this. May try watching another couple of Merchant-Ivory films before writing the sub-genre off completely. Okay seems i've reached the minimim characters now.

A film with all the chances to be discovered as a sort of experience by viewer. Sure, it is the meeting, a new one, between Henry James and James Ivory .

Sure, the cast is fantastic and Vanessa Redgrave, Madeleine Potter, Linda Hunt and, especially,Jessica Tandy are just admirable. And, sure Christopher Reeves propose one of that roles reminding silverwork masterpieces.

The subject ? It is easy to mentioned the feminist movement in America, the Bostonia relations, the art of show as form of propaganda, the selfishness and forms of vulnerability. But, obvious, it is far to be real enough.

It is a film like a confession. Powerful, gentle, profound honest. So, its beauty is very special. And new proof of the amazing art of James Ivory.