The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby

1947
Approved
1h 48m

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Cedric Hardwicke in The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby (1947)

A young, compassionate man struggles to save his family and friends from the abusive exploitation of his cold-hearted, grasping uncle.A young, compassionate man struggles to save his family and friends from the abusive exploitation of his cold-hearted, grasping uncle.A young, compassionate man struggles to save his family and friends from the abusive exploitation of his cold-hearted, grasping uncle.

Director
- Alberto Cavalcanti
Writers
- Charles Dickens
- John Dighton
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

6.9/10

1.1K

YOUR RATING

Director
- Alberto Cavalcanti
Writers
- Charles Dickens
- John Dighton
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

Photos76

+ 70

User reviews19

6.91K

Featured reviews

10clanciai

Great dramatization of one of Dickens' greatest novels

It is difficult to dramatize this extensive novel involving so many characters and intrigues, but this has been a successful one, actually succeeding in condensing an unsurveyable human panorama into a fairly perspicuous form, but much of its high quality depends on the general excellent acting. This was both Derek Bond's and Aubrey Woods' greatest roles, but Aubrey Woods is the one who grips and stays in your heart. The film is much inferior to the great Shakespeare company production of 1982, where Roger Rees made the perfect Nicholas Nickleby, but here Smike is more human and natural without unnecessary exaggerations. Cedric Hardwicke is the perfect Ralph Nickleby, almost shockingly convincing in his cold cruelty, while Bernard Miles as Noggs also is a prize winner. Both versions deserve 10 points, but in its realism this film actually beats the 1982 theatre performance, maybe especially for its expert concentration of a vast human universe into just one film. The cinematography is also outstanding, and above all, in all its concise concentration, it has succeeded to remain very faithful to Dickens.

jandesimpson

Uneven but worth a watch

To a certain extent the Ealing Studios version of "Nicholas Nickleby" was a victim of bad timing. How could it possibly compare with David Lean's superb adaptations of "Great Expectations" and "Oliver Twist" made around the same period. It was a fate that was later to befall Milos Forman's "Valmont" that unfortunately appeared at the same time as the Stephen Frears version of "Dangerous Liaisons". And yet Cavalcanti's foray into Dickens has partly itself to blame for its very unevenness. One can hardly blame the quality of the book, as some have done, when David Lean did such inspired things with a similarly lesser Dickens work such as "Oliver Twist". Admittedly "Nickleby" through its considerably greater length does pose problems of adaptation to the under two-hour format, but one can only admire just how much of the original narrative has been crammed in. As will by now be evident, this review is something of a mass of contradictions. On the one hand there are some scenes that work remarkably well, the early sequence at Dotheboys Hall for instance with the terrible Squeers menage all hamming it most entertainingly - Alfred Drayton and Sybil Thorndike could hardly be bettered. And there are others that quite frankly are something of a bore, many of the Nickleby family scenes where the acting ranging for Derek Bond's colourless Nicholas, Sally Ann Howes's simpering Kate and Mary Merrall's embarrassingly silly mother are the stuff of village hall rep. This is one of those films that both excite and annoy. However with so much that is forgettable there is one performance that remains quite unforgettable. Sir Cedric Hardwiche's Uncle Ralph is a beautifully controlled study of wickedness. His comeuppance at the end, when he is pursued by police to the upper floor of his house, brought out the very best in Cavalcanti. In a film where so much of the direction is flat and uninspired, this sequence with its camera virtuosity and expressionistic shadows is extraordinarily exciting. Although overall this version of "Nicholas Nickleby" ranks rather low in the Dickensian cinematic canon, it is not one to be overlooked entirely.

9bkoganbing

One Evil Uncle

In post World War II Great Britain there seemed to be a great revival in the work of Charles Dickens. Three of his classic novels were filmed in that period, Great Expectations, Oliver Twist, and Nicholas Nickleby.

Nicholas Nickleby is less known than the other two because Alec Guinness and John Mills got great roles and reached the top of the British cinema firmament as stars. Derek Bond in the title tole of Nicholas Nickleby never got to the heights that Mills and Guinness did. Still he was good in what was probably his career role.

Like the other two Dickens works Nicholas Nickleby involves the progress of a young man who has to overcome a lot of odds to attain prosperity and happiness. In this case his father dies and Bond with his mother Mary Merrall who is from the Billie Burke school of fluttery female and sister Sally Ann Howes look to his father's brother Cedric Hardwicke for charity.

But Hardwicke's not the charitable sort, in fact he's a scoundrel who has systematically lied and cheated others to build his fortune. He's not above using Howes as bait for his business and he sends Bond off to some 'school' that is little more than the work house we saw in Oliver Twist. Bond is a teacher there and leaves enraged at the treatment after giving the headmaster Alfred Drayton a thrashing the kind he relishes giving out to the kids.

Bond leaves with one of the kids played by Aubrey Woods who has been particularly abused and who in fact as it turns out was the victim of the most monstrous evil performed by Hardwicke. But we find out what that is toward the end of the film. Woods who has very few lines by facial expressions gives one of the most touching performances I've seen on film, he will live you longer than any of the other characters.

Dickens works abound in colorful characters and villains completely despicable. Cedric Hardwicke as Uncle Ralph Nickleby is a black hearted soul. Also standing out is Stanley Holloway head of a group of strolling players who gives help to Bond and Woods when they are at their lowest.

Nicholas Nickleby though it has been done on the big and small screen several times has this version to set a very high standard.

9Prismark10

The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby

Alberto Cavalcanti's has made a concise version of the story of Nicholas Nickleby for Ealing Studios.

Although Charles Dickens epic novel is judiciously pruned, the flavour and atmosphere remains.

This episodic film has greedy moneylender Ralph Nickleby (Cedric Hardwicke) reluctantly taking on his brother's family after his death in 1830.

Ralph quickly gets a job for nephew Nicholas Nickleby (Derek Bond) as a teacher working for Wackford Squeers. The school is a wretched place and Nicholas soon leaves when a young man Smike is being flogged.

Nicholas and Smike soon get in with theatrical producer Vincent Crummles (Stanley Holloway) and become actors.

Meanwhile Ralph also gets his niece working as a seamstress for low wages. Ralph also uses her to attract the attention of Lord Verisopht so he will borrow money from him.

Soon Nicholas gets wind of what Ralph has been up to. How some wealthy men plan to use and abuse his sister. So he comes to rescue his sister and mother.

Ralph also has a lusty eye for a pretty young woman Madeleine Bray (Jill Balcon) to be his bride. Her father is in debt to Ralph Nickleby. However Nicholas is also in love with her.

The film allows some of the actors to shine even in smaller roles. Stanley Holloway stands out as Crummles as well as Bernard Miles as the nice Newman Noggs. Cyril Fletcher more famous from the BBC television program That's Life is almost debauched as Mantalini.

Of course Cedric Hardwicke steals the film as the dastardly avaricious uncle Ralph. He does his duty to take care of his brother's family, he makes sure they all get to work.

Although the complexities of the novel and the various characters had to be reduced. This is an enjoyably brisk film which is not full of cloying sentimentality. It also shows the harshness and cruelty of life in that era.

Surprisingly this is the only British film version of Nicholas Nickleby made in the 20th century.

tedg

Someone Else's Silent Film

Gosh, what a disaster.

Here's the problem with Dickens. He makes a lot of story, just chocks things full of characters, motives, events. Its not that he is describing a world so much as creating one. That's the central notion here that in entering a Dickens project, you enter a world that is especially suited for the narrative arcs he will give us.

Those are arcs concerned with the ridiculous state of man, a particular kind of London-oriented man. There are only two balls he juggles, this writer. One is the notion of justice (though not always precisely what we would like) and the other is the ridiculousness. We'll see that as humor when we consider certain characters or events, but its really rooted in the nature of the world.

Its a great formula, this notion of the world, a sort of battle between the firm laws of fate that always spin correctly and the contrasting notion that there is a wobble in some of those wheels, perhaps coming from our weaknesses, perhaps God just having a bad day.

If you want to translate one of his projects to film, you need to capture this first. And you need to do it at the most basic level, quite literally in the creation of the world we see. The cinematic vocabulary IS up to it. The version of this story by McGrath understood this intuitively, though he would probably describe it superficially as the balance of gravitas and humor.

This version... Well, they got all the bits of the story in there. And they have a remarkably pretty girl as the sister-at-risk. And, alas, the world they have created is quite competent and coherent visually. In fact if this weren't Dickens, it would almost make sense to watch it without sound. If you know the story, you can do that with some of these old films that have disastrous management of sound, speech and score as this does.

But that coherent world we'd see has nothing to do with the world of Dickens.

Stay away from this one. Its dreadful. Everything that makes it a movie gets in the way of everything that makes it a good book.

Ted's Evaluation -- 1 of 3: You can find something better to do with this part of your life.

Storyline

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Trivia
On reading the script, Hollywood censor Joseph Breen objected to the use of the expression "dem'd", but said that "deshit" and "deshed" were allowed. Most importantly, a character could not be shown hanging himself in order to escape the police, but could if it was out of remorse.

Quotes
Ralph Nickleby: Noggs, take down this letter. "To Mr. Squeers, the Saracen's Head, Snow Hill. I have decided to finance any legal action you may care to take against my nephew."
Newman Noggs: Ho, ho, ho! He isn't there.
Ralph Nickleby: Who isn't?
Newman Noggs: Mr. Squeers. He's at Bow Street Police Station!
Ralph Nickleby: You're lying.
Newman Noggs: Ohhh no, I'm not. And Mr Squeers hasn't been lying either. Mr Squeers has confessed to conspiracy with regard to a birth certificate and certain letters purporting to prove that Mr Snawley was the father!
Ralph Nickleby: I don't know what you're talking about.
Newman Noggs: Don't you? Mr Squeers says otherwise. So does Mr Snawley. So do the police.
Ralph Nickleby: Hold your tongue, you treacherous, sneaking...!
Newman Noggs: I've held my tongue for 15 years! Stood by helpless while you've ruined many another as once you ruined me.
Ralph Nickleby: You ruined yourself. You'd sell your soul, if you had one, for a little gin.
Newman Noggs: But I wouldn't sell my own flesh and blood. And it's not only little Kate I'm thinking of. I've seen the boy, Smike, the living image of his mother, of your wife!
Ralph Nickleby: My wife?
Newman Noggs: Didn't know I knew that, did you, that you had a son? Your wife died, but the child lived. And you had to keep his birth a secret, or the money would have gone to him. You put him out with a poor family, didn't you, to bring him up as their own? You paid them well for it, haven't you, ever since? Well, they didn't keep the boy!
Ralph Nickleby: It isn't true.
Newman Noggs: They put him to school in Yorkshire. They put him in Dotheboys Hall!
Ralph Nickleby: They cheated me!
Newman Noggs: Yes. They cheated you. Just as you've cheated hundreds of others!
Ralph Nickleby: In the gutter for this! And I'll deal with you too!
Newman Noggs: Will you? Will you? I've waited all these years for a chance to settle our account. And now, at last, it's come. The police have been here, and I've told them everything. There'll be another charge against you now: depriving your own son of his birthright, robbing him of a fortune! They'll transport you for that, you know! Hahahahahaha! They'll confiscate every penny you've got! Hahahahahaha! You can't escape now! It doesn't matter where you go! Off to see a lawyer, is that it? See if he can help you! Or are you going to bring the boy home? Own him as your own son, give him back the money? No use! No good! Nothing can help you now, money or lawyers! It doesn't matter where you go! YOU'RE TOO LATE! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! TOO LATE! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!