Dorian Gray: The Review: "A toast." "To what?" "Intoxication..."
As promised, a proper review of Dorian Gray, opposed to me simply fangirling over how pretty Ben is...
Dorian Gray, the latest classic to be reworked into a movie for the modern audience, and they didn’t do too badly either. Ben shines in this movie and for the first time since he came to our attention as the lead in Prince Caspian, we can really see what he’s capable of. Our Ben is anything but a one trick pony, let me tell you.
To begin with, I would like to propose a question; when exactly did I become immune to the fact that half of the world are still freaked out/disgusted by same sex relations?
At the height of a party Dorian is throwing, Basil comes looking for him and they slink off onto the upstairs landing to discuss the portrait and Basil showing it as the headlining piece at an exhibition. An intoxicated Dorian comes onto the oblivious artist after rebuffing the idea, deciding to show him his gratitude in an entirely different way and in the back row of our cinema screen, a bunch of teenage girls exclaim, "Ew!"
Basil’s pure fascination with Dorian was touched upon in the book of course and in the movie it’s expanded upon in a very obvious way. I liked this actually and while reading the book, kind of strangely wished it would happen, but alas…
Anyway, I’m off the point. These girls were clearly disgusted by this, while myself and prettypsycho sat there grinning like Cheshire cats, our interest peaked. Their declaration made me think only one thing, "What’s wrong? I don’t understand your problem." The world of fandom is so accepting of slash pairings that I sometimes forget the real world is different and when I am reminded of that fact, it upsets me.
Why can’t a person simply watch a movie? Why do they feel the need to declare their disgust for a whole cinema to hear? There is absolutely nothing wrong with two men kissing and it’s time that some people learnt to accept that on face value.
I love Basil, I really do. Clearly he was delusional, but still. He only ever wanted the best for Dorian and look what happened as a result. Poor sod. I’ll say no more on that though for those of you who have yet to read the book/watch the movie.
I’m slightly torn in my overall opinion. I think it’s the ending that’s throwing me (which appears to be happening with everything just lately). There was no point to introducing the character of Emily and I think this will be the main downfall, especially for fans of the original book. Don’t try and fix something that isn’t broken, as the saying goes. Admittedly the ending of the book is a bit of an anticlimax, but they could have improved upon it without the need to bring in another love interest (especially in the form of Henry Wotton’s daughter).
Not that I hated Emily, anything but. She proved to be quite wonderful, straightforward in her opinions and brimming with an unfathomable love for life. There is a particularly nice scene involving a picnic basket and a torrential downpour, although I’ll say no more. When you see the movie, you will understand.
That said though, it was still unnecessary and spoilt the overview of the entire movie.
Another small complaint I have is to do with some of the editing near the beginning, particularly during the Sibyl Vane scenes. I saw the "We shouldn’t be afraid of our feelings, Sib" clip before watching the movie and presumed the jumps were edited in for TV or whatever. So when watching the movie and realising that no, that’s just how it’s been cut, I was a little disappointed. Wonky editing makes Heather Belle very unhappy.
Otherwise the editing of the scenes were lovely, not on par with Atonement lovely obviously, but lovely all the same. I am a big fan of beautifully done cinematography.
Sex is predominant within the movie which I, of course, have no complaints about (I’m a perve, I’ll admit it). They may have overdone it slightly, but for today’s audience, they probably needed to do so or else Dorian’s debauchery wouldn’t have fetched so much as a raised eyebrow.
There were a few truly superb scenes, but I don’t want to go into great detail and spoil everyone. My personal favourite involved some nice cutting back and forth between an afternoon tea party and a particularly rough session where Dorian was dripping with his own blood. The use of colours in that scene really left an impact on me. That’s also where the "jammy scone" mood came from the other day (if you were wondering flist).
I found the way they brought the portrait to life extremely effective and it had much more of presence, so much so that Dorian became conscious of it and the way it changed practically every second of the day toward the end. Probably could have done without the rasping breath sound effects, something about those ended up a little comical, although I guess they did add to the menace. At the final unveil I couldn’t help getting a tad anxious, but then a group of girls ruined the moment when they started laughing quite brazenly. There really wasn’t anything funny about it and this angered me, as well as several others we found on our way out of the screen afterwards.
Alas, thanks to the 15 certificate, everyone who goes to see this movie will have to suffer the never-ending tittering of teenage girls who have turned up purely because they fancy the ass off Ben Barnes. prettypsycho and I do too of course, but we can also appreciate and thoroughly enjoy a good piece of drama when it’s presented to us.
All in all, Dorian Gray is pretty fantastic and I’m rallying for a re-watch (one where I’ll skip the end).
Go and see it, but be sure to keep an open mind book fans, or else you may be sourly disappointed. Adaptations will always be just that, a take on the original (not a carbon copy). If you don’t open yourself up to new possibilities, you will forever be dissatisfied, with everything.
.x.
Dorian Gray, the latest classic to be reworked into a movie for the modern audience, and they didn’t do too badly either. Ben shines in this movie and for the first time since he came to our attention as the lead in Prince Caspian, we can really see what he’s capable of. Our Ben is anything but a one trick pony, let me tell you.
To begin with, I would like to propose a question; when exactly did I become immune to the fact that half of the world are still freaked out/disgusted by same sex relations?
At the height of a party Dorian is throwing, Basil comes looking for him and they slink off onto the upstairs landing to discuss the portrait and Basil showing it as the headlining piece at an exhibition. An intoxicated Dorian comes onto the oblivious artist after rebuffing the idea, deciding to show him his gratitude in an entirely different way and in the back row of our cinema screen, a bunch of teenage girls exclaim, "Ew!"
Basil’s pure fascination with Dorian was touched upon in the book of course and in the movie it’s expanded upon in a very obvious way. I liked this actually and while reading the book, kind of strangely wished it would happen, but alas…
Anyway, I’m off the point. These girls were clearly disgusted by this, while myself and prettypsycho sat there grinning like Cheshire cats, our interest peaked. Their declaration made me think only one thing, "What’s wrong? I don’t understand your problem." The world of fandom is so accepting of slash pairings that I sometimes forget the real world is different and when I am reminded of that fact, it upsets me.
Why can’t a person simply watch a movie? Why do they feel the need to declare their disgust for a whole cinema to hear? There is absolutely nothing wrong with two men kissing and it’s time that some people learnt to accept that on face value.
I love Basil, I really do. Clearly he was delusional, but still. He only ever wanted the best for Dorian and look what happened as a result. Poor sod. I’ll say no more on that though for those of you who have yet to read the book/watch the movie.
I’m slightly torn in my overall opinion. I think it’s the ending that’s throwing me (which appears to be happening with everything just lately). There was no point to introducing the character of Emily and I think this will be the main downfall, especially for fans of the original book. Don’t try and fix something that isn’t broken, as the saying goes. Admittedly the ending of the book is a bit of an anticlimax, but they could have improved upon it without the need to bring in another love interest (especially in the form of Henry Wotton’s daughter).
Not that I hated Emily, anything but. She proved to be quite wonderful, straightforward in her opinions and brimming with an unfathomable love for life. There is a particularly nice scene involving a picnic basket and a torrential downpour, although I’ll say no more. When you see the movie, you will understand.
That said though, it was still unnecessary and spoilt the overview of the entire movie.
Another small complaint I have is to do with some of the editing near the beginning, particularly during the Sibyl Vane scenes. I saw the "We shouldn’t be afraid of our feelings, Sib" clip before watching the movie and presumed the jumps were edited in for TV or whatever. So when watching the movie and realising that no, that’s just how it’s been cut, I was a little disappointed. Wonky editing makes Heather Belle very unhappy.
Otherwise the editing of the scenes were lovely, not on par with Atonement lovely obviously, but lovely all the same. I am a big fan of beautifully done cinematography.
Sex is predominant within the movie which I, of course, have no complaints about (I’m a perve, I’ll admit it). They may have overdone it slightly, but for today’s audience, they probably needed to do so or else Dorian’s debauchery wouldn’t have fetched so much as a raised eyebrow.
There were a few truly superb scenes, but I don’t want to go into great detail and spoil everyone. My personal favourite involved some nice cutting back and forth between an afternoon tea party and a particularly rough session where Dorian was dripping with his own blood. The use of colours in that scene really left an impact on me. That’s also where the "jammy scone" mood came from the other day (if you were wondering flist).
I found the way they brought the portrait to life extremely effective and it had much more of presence, so much so that Dorian became conscious of it and the way it changed practically every second of the day toward the end. Probably could have done without the rasping breath sound effects, something about those ended up a little comical, although I guess they did add to the menace. At the final unveil I couldn’t help getting a tad anxious, but then a group of girls ruined the moment when they started laughing quite brazenly. There really wasn’t anything funny about it and this angered me, as well as several others we found on our way out of the screen afterwards.
Alas, thanks to the 15 certificate, everyone who goes to see this movie will have to suffer the never-ending tittering of teenage girls who have turned up purely because they fancy the ass off Ben Barnes. prettypsycho and I do too of course, but we can also appreciate and thoroughly enjoy a good piece of drama when it’s presented to us.
All in all, Dorian Gray is pretty fantastic and I’m rallying for a re-watch (one where I’ll skip the end).
Go and see it, but be sure to keep an open mind book fans, or else you may be sourly disappointed. Adaptations will always be just that, a take on the original (not a carbon copy). If you don’t open yourself up to new possibilities, you will forever be dissatisfied, with everything.
.x.