What do you guys think? Do you think Fleur will be ultimately equally unhappy since she married a man she didn't love? Or will she be more like her mother, having meaningless affairs here and there while enjoying her husband's fortune?
shareFleur was for me ultimately THE MAJOR victim of three people: Jolyon above all (so ironically); Soames (because he's a natural borm b*st*rd); and finally, Irene, who didn't raise a finger to see herself as a young woman in Irene. I feel so strongly about this that I can't re-watch the final episodes of the series, because Fleur as the moral compass of the series' conclusion condemns Irene too successfully.
I think Fleur will end up even worse than Irene ended up, and at a much more advanced age.
Eh... What exactly did Irene do towards Fleur in this version? She was fully prepared to let Jon make his own choice, when neither Jolyon nor June was. But then, he decided to dump Fleur. So there was that... Irene happens to also be the only one in their camp, who came to understand that if they forced Jon to give up his love to please them, well, then they would only be awful hypocrites...
It seems to be different in the novel and the 1960s adaption, so that is probably why you think like you do. But as for the 2000s version, Irene handled the situation as well as anyone could have done under the same circumstance. Which is more than I can say for Jolyon and June, who decided to judge Fleur, without knowing a thing about her, because of what her father had done...
Intelligence and purity.
You're right that Irene was prepared to let the couple "live." And I'm definitely talking about the 2002 version. The problem with Irene is that her lifelong passivity encouraged in every man who came within her orbit a tendency to protect her. We never see Irene stand up to Jolyon's obduracy--and of course, we *can't* see it, because he takes a coronary and dies over the affair. I'm an Irene defender; I "get" Irene. I understand her repulsion that her son should love the daughter of her reptilian rapist. But she did not speak up as passionately in defense of Fleur and Jolyon Jr.'s union as she could have. She didn't.
Pax.
I strongly disagree with that assessment of Fleur. Her worst enemy was not Irene, nor Joe; it was herself. From the start, she exploited the fact that Jon was weaker than she was. she constantly lied to him and manipulated him, and got him to lie, which she obviously knew was against his nature. if they had gotten married it would have been an utter disaster. The greatest obstacle to her happiness is that she is so spoiled, she has to have everything, and immediately. It wouldn't have been long before she grew tired of Jon and resented him.
Sorry, but I cannot possibly see Fleur as the moral compass!
Agreed, she is the product of spoliation by the father, which in itself is probably the product of the failed relationship with Irene.
share2022 has been the year I learned a lot about Narcissistic Personality Disorder, in particular:
- Love bombing
- inflated sense of importance
- lack of boundaries
- needy for attention
- repressed insecurities
- discarding/blanking people when they’re no longer useful
Does anyone think Fleur might be written as someone with NPD (even if Gallsworthy could not have realized that was “a thing”?)
I think Fleur was destined to be an unfaithful wife regardless of who she married. She is so spoiled and determined to get her way. She cannot deny herself anything and cannot be patient and wait, she must always force it so she can get what she wants immediately. She's reckless, thoughtless, and runs over the feelings of others.
shareWow, you really don't like the character. Since your mind is apparently so set on inferring all that is bad about her, I'll forbear from pointing out that *all* your inferences are, indeed, inferences!
shareWhat did you think the writers were trying to tell the audience by showing her lying to Jon, lying to Joe when she promised to give Jon time and space to be with his family during his father's illness, and then immediately plotting to elope to Scotland with Jon right away, taking him away from his dying father, knowing Jon didn't know about it?
She manipulated the invitation to Val and Holly's. She asked Jon if he lied and told him she lied all the time, and then asked him to lie, knowing that it was against his nature.
Hi again. 😃
I couldn't find the posts I was looking for earlier (only had my phone, lol). But I have had a chance to look for them again and would like to share some of the examples that catbookss posted last year shortly after rewatching the series and taking notes about Fleur. There are many examples of Fleur's lies and manipulations (actual examples, not inferences).
by catbookss
» Thu Aug 27 2015 22:53:20 Flag ▼ | Reply |
IMDb member since April 2013
Post Edited: Thu Aug 27 2015 22:58:33
Okay, I have the time now to answer you properly :)
Her first lie was about Val and Holly inviting her to their farm. She lied right in front of Val to Holly, saying Val had invited her when he hadn't. She was completely shameless about it, because Val obviously knew he hadn't invited her. She then pretended to Holly she wanted to become friends with her, and that’s why she wanted to come, when it had nothing to do with her wanting to be friends, it had solely to do with her desire to see Jon again. Then she lies to Winifred, right in front of Val and Holly, saying they’d both invited her to visit the next week, despite Holly saying it wasn’t convenient that week. Holly and Val were too polite to call her on it, or deny her. Later she told the same lie to her father, saying Val had asked her to the farm. All of this was very manipulative.
Once at the farm, drinking tea with Holly, clearly having no interest in getting to know her and becoming friends, Fleur again lies and says she’s there to get to know Holly. Holly, who's not a fool, knows Fleur is lying. Again.
She asks Jon if he’s a good liar. He says no, and she’s disappointed. Then says if they want to be friends, they have to keep it a secret from their families – i.e., lie.
Not a lie on Fleur's part, but telling of her, Jolyon asked Holly what Fleur was like, after the visit to their farm, and Holly replied “A rather having sort of a person.” (I.e., a Forsyte in the manner of Soames.)
Again not a lie, but another manipulation: When Fleur comes to say goodbye to Jon at the farm, she says she’s leaving then because she told her father her trip was only for the weekend and “besides, I want to keep him sweet.”
On the train ride on the way home, when it makes a stop, she holds down the handle of their compartment when a woman and her child try to get in, because she wants to be alone with Jon. Even though the train left the station seconds later, and she undoubtedly caused the woman and child to miss it, she laughed. No one else matters to Fleur, except Fleur and that she gets what she wants, which was more time alone with Jon.
When Jon arrives home and greets Irene and Jolyon, Irene asks him about Fleur – if he saw her, what she’s like. He said oh she was so-so, acts very nervous and evasive, and naturally this worries Irene and Jolyon, knowing it wasn’t like Jon to behave that way and knowing it had something to do with Fleur and her influence on him.
When she and Soames go into town to buy clothes together, she lies to him again, saying she needed to visit her club to post something, when she was really going to meet with Jon in the park.
Shortly after this Soames confronts Fleur, saying he knows she was with Jon at Val’s farm. She lies again, telling him she hadn’t seen Jon in three weeks, or written or spoken to him, adding “Cross my heart, hope to die.”
She lied to Jolyon about who she was when she went to Robin Hill when Jon was in Europe with Irene. Later she says to Jon about this, “It [her saying who she was] didn’t come up, and when it did, it was too late” – another lie. It did in fact come up early on in the conversation, and there was nothing preventing her from saying who she was instead of lying, but, it didn't serve her interests to be honest and straightforward. Justifiably, when Jolyon later meets her as Fleur, he's angry that she lied to him about who she really was.
After Monty’s funeral Soames asks again if there’s nothing between she and Jon, and again she lies and says there isn’t.
Jolyon comes to the cottage Jon, and Fleur, were staying in, and he was quite nice to her, even apologizing for how unpleasant he was to her when the four of them had tea at Robin Hill. He confided in her that he was seriously ill, that neither Jon nor Irene knew about it, and appealed to her better nature, asking Fleur to end things with Jon, because once he died, Irene would be all alone (knowing that Soames was still obsessed with her, and would come after her -- which he did). Fleur agreed to it, although understandably reluctantly, but by the time Jon returned to the cottage, she went back on her word to Jolyon, and had concocted her plan for them to establish residency in Scotland, where they could marry without parental permission. That was an awful, and dishonest thing to do. I do, however, give her credit for telling Jon that Jolyon had not come there to check up on him, and she did attempt to get Jon to go back home and make amends with his father. Once again, no character was written without any redeeming value, including Fleur.
When she came to Jon right after his father died, she asked him “Is it very awful?” that was the second sentence she said. When he replied “Pretty bad,” her very next thing she said was that the suitcases were still in Scotland, and the trains run every day. His father had JUST died and all she can think about it what she wants: to get married ASAP to Jon, she didn’t care about his grief. What a horribly selfish, insensitive creature, and Jon realized it in the moment, but was all too soon seduced by her and allowed himself to be manipulated by her.
After Soames comes to Robin Hill to try to plead Fleur’s case, and Fleur came to the back of the house, Irene approached her and very gently told her to “Go home with your father, my dear, give us all some time to think.” But what does Fleur do? She berates Irene, told her “Don’t touch me!” accused her of pretending to make herself look nice and lying so Irene could “have him all to herself," even though that was far from the case. She then spat at Irene “He’s mine, you understand? Mine!” Never mind Irene had said several times the decision was Jon’s, and had apologized to him for keeping him away from Fleur. What a b!tch!
Then she turns on Soames, when he comes and tries to comfort her! She hits him, pushes him, and yells at him, both outside the house and in the carriage. Soames had done nothing but coddle and try to please Fleur, even at his own expense. When she asked him to intervene and plead her case with Irene, he told her it would only "stir things up," and as we know, that's exactly what it did. But, selfishly, she insisted he do it anyway, regardless of his feelings, to which he replied to her "You don't really care about me!" And it's true, she didn't. She cared only about what she wanted, no matter what the cost to anyone else, including her own father.
After that, she won't even speak to him, and treats him abominably, right up to the wedding with Michael Mont. Soames asks Annette why she treats him this way. She says "This boy, Jon Forsyte, he’s hurt her. She’s angry." He responds "Why with me?" Annette replies, accurately and with some compassion "Because she can."
Fleur's final lie was to Michael Mont. He didn’t want to marry her unless she was through with her feelings for Jon, and loved him (Mont). He specifically asks her if she loves him, and if she didn’t, said they should call it off. “Face to face, can you tell me you love me?” She lied, deceiving him.
Michael Mont was the most likable and honorable character in the series. His only real flaw was wanting Fleur and not being able to see the kind of person Fleur really was, which was a lying and manipulative b!tch. He deserved much better than Fleur, who'd flirted with him (the scene in the boat after the train ride home with Jon, splashing water at him), whom he made laugh and she obviously liked him, and whom she deceived.
Fleur was beautiful, and had a certain appealing joie de vivre, but beyond that, she was overall a lying and manipulative person, lacking integrity and character. And so, I have a hard time sympathizing with her.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0260615/board/thread/246588010?d=247743731#247743731
I think Fleur was destined to be an unfaithful wife regardless of who she married. She is so spoiled and determined to get her way. She cannot deny herself anything and cannot be patient and wait, she must always force it so she can get what she wants immediately. She's reckless, thoughtless, and runs over the feelings of others.
Folks! (Randommoves and CakesandAle) Do you or do you not agree that you like others to treat you the way you treat them? I *hate* Soames. I hate the seeds of selfishness the series shows us being sown in Fleur as a small child when he nay-says Annette in favor of Fleur's whims. But I can't call anything that Fleur does as a young woman "reckless, thoughtless" or indicative of someone who wants to "run over the feelings of others."
She's hopelessly in love with a young man who doesn't love her as much as she loves him. Don't you see the cosmic irony, the sins-of-the-fathers, aspect of all this? Soames made Irene's life hell; and for his sins, the apple of his eye will suffer the exact fate.
In regard to Michael Mont, whom Catbookss accurately called innocent: why give him the benefit of the doubt while you envision his future married life, and conclude the absolute worst about Fleur?
If the series had shown Fleur being cruel, self-centered, and demanding in the way her father was shown (via dialogue and, like, rape) to be, then I'd eat buttered popcorn each time I watch Fleur getting her heart broken. But the series does NOT show Fleur to be anything other than a spoiled girl chastened by love.
I sincerely can't condemn a character the "text" of the show gives us no reason to.
Yeah, Fleur might have had her share of flaws. But I can't hate her like some people do. She is treated way too unfairly by Jolyon and June to be dislikable in my eyes.
shareI agree 100%. Not only do I/can I not hate her; I think she's the ultimate victim of the series (if not of the novels). Unlike Irene, Fleur has signed on for a life sentence. She's not strong enough to emulate Irene.
shareWell, Fleur cheated on her husband with Jon. Of course, only that will not necessarily make her some carbon copy of Irene. She is much more like her own mother, Annette. But it does show us that Fleur also refused to let her life simply end with (what she would have seen as) a marriage to the wrong man. And that is something, that is very similar to Irene during her marriage to Soames...
shareI don't agree she was treated unfairly by Jolyon. That was of her own making, by baldfacedly lying to Jolyon when she went to Robin Hill. Why would he be anything other than angry and distrustful of her after that?
Even so, when he went to the cottage where Jon and Fleur were staying, he apologized for being rude to her the day he discovered she'd deceived him, and even bared his soul to her. But, she deceived him yet again by agreeing to what he asked, and then immediately turning around and betraying him.
But you leave out that Jolyon attempted to guilt Fleur into giving up the love of her life. Why would she be obligated to keep such a promise?
shareWhy would she agree to make a promise, thereby obligating herself by her own word (which meant virtually nothing) and then not keep it, making herself a liar and dishonorable?
Which is, not coincidentally, exactly what her father did before her.
Don't intend to keep a promise? Then don't make it.
Where you see Jolyon as attempting to guilt Fleur into doing anything, I see him as opening his heart to her and attempting to appeal to her better nature. Of which she had none.
I know you meant to say "giving up the love of her life." But let me ask you, exactly when did Fleur show love towards Jon, or her father, or anyone else, let alone that Jon was the "love of her life"?
Love means you care very deeply about another's well being. She never displayed that towards Jon or anyone else. She was a spoiled, self-absorbed, self-entitled person who cared solely about her own wants or well being, no one else's, not even her own father's.
You asked before what evidence there was of this, and I went through the series laying out very clearly and in detail what we were shown and told about Fleur, her lack of character, and inability to think of anyone outside of herself.
A great deal of this was in To Let, which you later admitted you haven't seen for years, and showed no interest in seeing again. Yet you repeatedly defend and sympathise with Fleur, although the series shows us very clearly she's anything but admirable. I don't understand this.
I have to confess that when I re-watched the scene between Jolyon and Fleur, he came off as a bit better than what I remembered it. Even so, he had no right to guilt Fleur into promising that she would break up with Jon. Especially not if you remember that he once chose his lover over his family, so it was pure hypocricy. And I really don't blame Fleur for not keeping such a promise. I don't see the connection between this and that Soames broke his promise either.
Well, I don't believe that you have to be as selfless as that to love somebody else. So I honestly think that Soames loved Irene, and that Fleur loved Jon. It is true that both father and daughter had been spoiled by their rich parents, so they couldn't accept that they could want something and still have to lose it. But love is still love, even if Soames in particular didn't have any idea how to express such emotions in a proper way. So I guess that we have to disagree.
You were of course right about Fleur's flaws. But you can be flawed and still be sympathetic, and I feel sorry for Fleur. Because no matter how bad her "lack of character" might have been, she could have been a perfect angel, and Jon's family still would have hated her guts, because of what her father had done to his mother before she was even born. And I don't believe that they knew about most of the things, that you have put on your list. But they still hated her.
And I don't really get your last paragraph. It is true that I hadn't seen "To Let" for years, when I started discussing it with you. But now I have seen most of it again (and I have only the last half of the last epsiode left). And I never said that I never wanted to see it again, so I don't know where you got that from.
Yikes. Al I can say is that I hope as you get older and experience parenthood and possibly grandparenthood you will come to understand the circumstances more clearly from Jolyon’s point of view. He was a father who had already lost a child in war. Now, as he was dying, he was losing another child. Fleur knew about the illness and deliberately kept it from Jon. She tried to elope with him in a hurry, to secure him legally before he foind out about Jolyon’s illness. How do you think that would have boded for their future together if she had succeeded?
Gross.
I have no kids and will never have any, but I don't see what that has to with it.
I stand by my point from three years ago.
Jolyon decided to distrust Fleur just because of who her father was.
And that is why he refused to give her a chance.
Furthermore, maybe he should have talked to Jon before trying to guilt Fleur?
That way, there would be no risk of him losing another child as he was dying!
Unfortunately, both of Jon's sisters decided to distrust Fleur as well.
So there was no support from anybody, even though Irene was more understanding than before in this version.
I think you’re forgetting that Jolyon knew Jon had been lying to them, and that was something that Jon had only begun doing after he became involved with Fleur. That, to me, was a red flag to Jolyon not to trust Fleur.
And I agree with the other poster who said Joe wasn’t trying to guilt Fleur. He was opening his heart to her so she might understand why he and Irene needed Jon at that time.
Honestly, the fact that she knew about Joe’s illness and then manipulated Jon to attempt to elope with him only suggests that she and Jon were always doomed. She would always hold back important info that might prevent her getting what she wants. If she can withhold from a man she claims to love that his father, whom she knows he loves, is dying, then there isn’t anything she wouldn’t do to get what she wants.
And I’m not trying to be condescending about parenthood. I’ll just say that my experience as a parent has taught me a lot about life, love, commitment that I never knew I didn’t know. Things my parents said and did, that I used to roll my eyes about, I understand better and can appreciate their perspective.
I imagine such understanding cam come about from other experiences, too. It isn’t just parenthood. Age and maturity certainly has shown me I didn’t know as much as I thought I did.
I think that Fleur would have ended up like her mother. She would have had a string of lovers and Mont would have known about but they would never have spoken of. She would have run hot and cold with her son: either ignoring him or smothering him depending on her mood at the moment.
shareSounds like you have read trilogy #3. They never filmed that trilogy for this series, but they did for the 1967 series. Fleur is gross. She only begins to see things differently after her father’s death (which was caused by her carelessness).
From Goodreads:
Often incorrectly called The Forsyte Saga - the nine novel sequence properly known as The Forstye Chronicles contains three trilogies-
the first trilogy - The Forsyte Saga (The Man of Property - In Chancery- To Let).
The second trilogy- A Modern Comedy (The White Monkey- The Silver Spoon- Swan Song)
the third and concluding trilogy- End of the Chapter (Maid in Waiting- Flowering Wilderness- One More River)