fanaticita: thank you for your comments, allow me to expand upon my points from earlier:
Perhaps I trivialize young love a little, but only because I've been there and lived through it. Yes, at the time, I too felt it was deep and meaningful, just as all young lovers do, but age gives people perspective and with time you come to realize that what was once your whole world becomes a much smaller matter. That is why I feel that love between people of maturity, people who "know better", people who are no longer slaves to their hormones, or to societies pressures (or less so at any rate), is a deeper, more meaningful form of the emotion. It is one that has power and consequence. It isn't just a phase you grow out of, as puppy love tends to be. That's where you find the love that lasts and moves mountains and such and such. I feel that would have been a more fitting kind of love for the film to explore given the weight and power the visuals seemed to place on the emotion involved. But the maturity wasn't there, either by mistake or by design, in the characters in the film, and thus I was left with a feeling that their love would have burnt itself out quite quickly, as all young passion tends to do, had Keats not died.
The only reason I felt that Keats' death scene was stripped of its impact was because Cornish had already spent her emotional lot numerous times elsewhere in the film (over matters far more trivial). Great actors know how to "keep something in the bag" for the final climax of the film or play, rather than go through their entire emotional range in the first act. You say Campion was looking for the internalization of emotion and not an exposition of wailing and grand emotion? Perhaps this is true when speaking of the scenes involving expressing the joy of love, but certainly that was not the case during the scenes involving its misery! Cornish expresses her desire to die, or the feeling that she is indeed dying, on at least three separate occasions in the film that I can remember. You're right, though, she seemed very restrained during the moments of happiness and joy. Perhaps it is that inconsistency which was confusing. It seemed as though the character should be mature, she appeared to keep her feelings in check, hadn't gone to bed with the man, etc. Still, whenever anything didn't go her way she throws tantrums like a little princess? Make up your mind Cornish (or Campion). The woman was either mature enough to recognize love for what it truly meant, what the risks involved were, and what the rewards could be, or she knew nothing of love and was merely following every impulse of her heart.
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aGuiltySoul
15 years ago
As fine as I find your argument for mature love, I don't see how it applies to this film or this story. Fanny and Keats met when she was 18 and he was 23, they shared not quite 3 years before his death. There was no other time to explore between them. As for whether their love would have "burnt itself out," you are applying your personal prejudices onto the lives of strangers. If you read Andrew Motion's biography of Keats, there is quite a lot there about how Fanny grew up rather quickly to confront the extraordinary pressure Keats had to deal with regarding not only his failing health but also his lack of acceptance as a poet. She became his emotional foundation. He described his relationship with her as akin to a religious conversion because it changed his perspective and altered what he valued most dear.
As for your contention that Cornish "had already spent her emotional lot number times" before the scene within her character learns of Keats' death, I hardly know how to reply. Abbie Cornish's performance as Fanny is overall restrained, even when in the grip of teenage emotion. Yes, she lays abed when she doesn't hear from Keats and even calls for a knife at one point in order to kill herself. Her mother finds her weeping over his one page letter. "It's over," she says. If you find that well tuned display of a young girl's frustration to be overspent, then you must live a very, very restrained life.
My biggest problem with your arguments is that they fail to follow the arc of Fanny's character. It is after Keats returns from his original journey away from her, especially after he falls ill, that we witness her take great strides into maturity. She no longer wails or pouts. We see her dig deep and confront the inevitable future, or lack of a future, of a life with Keats. Rather than fight those who oppose her relationship with Keats, she accepts it and yet persists in the decisions she has made to honor her feelings. Finally, instead of wildly weeping or threatening, she cojoles her mother to allow her to acompany him to Italy and silently accepts the refusal. She falls into a depression when he finally leaves, but once again, no histrionics, just quiet withdrawal. We witness Fanny's growth into womanhood. That is not inconsistency, but change. Once again, the arc of her character.
"I'd never ask you to trust me. It's the cry of a guilty soul."
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jfp29
15 years ago
Thank you for that beautifully worded defense.
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