Eline Vere is a real costume drama inspired and based on the book with the same title by Louis Couperus, one of the Dutch great classic writers.
Being Dutch myself makes me somewhat biased ofcourse but things are as they are.
Set in The Hague of 1890, we find Eline Vere, a beautiful young society lady who is as naive as she is neurotic. She is experiencing her first steps as a young adult in a very strict and controlling high society. Her perception of love is very childish and obviously will bring lot's of drama, which will feed her neurotic tendencies to 'explosive' situations. Her behaviour is frowned upon by her peers and she is slowly but steadily pushed out of their high society.
One could make references with
Anna Karenina by Tolstoj, because both of the ladies are unstable and unlucky in love with very dramatic episodes and so on.
The cast really delivers, they bring to life a believable glimpse in a past life.
The costumes, music, settings, use of light and photography are all very decent.
Michael York has a nice cameo in this, by the way, pretty long movie.
Like I stated before, this movie is only enjoyable if you like the costume drama genre at all. It is a nice movie to watch with your better half, which I did and we were absolutely entertained.
Have fun watching this 'classic'.
Rogier.
