Spotlight

Spotlight Date: 9-May-10
Spoiler Rating: Medium

A Tale of Two Cities (1935, 1958)

Along with A Christmas Carol, A Tale of Two Cities is the work of Charles Dickens that best lends itself to cinematic adaptation. It has danger and action, an epic historical backdrop, and one of the greatest characters ever invented whose story must wet the eye of any viewer with a pulse. Both the definitive Hollywood version (1935) and its later British counterpart (1958) do a good job translating the tale's scope and emotional wallop to the screen. While the earlier picture has a slight edge due to its more Dickensian nature, both are eminently worth watching.

The adventure takes place before and during the French Revolution, when both Paris and London were touched by the storm of change. (Look for brief appearances by Basil Rathbone, then Christopher Lee as a vile marquis who illustrates what prompted the revolution.) The novel hinges on the physical likeness between two very different men, yet neither movie employs the same actor in both roles or emphasizes this connection. The limelight belongs to the immortal Sydney Carton, barrister, drunkard, and lifelong ne'er-do-well. Though brilliant and handsome, he regards himself as worthless and acts accordingly, spending most of his time with a bottle and allowing his legal partner to take credit for his achievements. His supposed double, Charles Darnay, is a French aristocrat who gave up his station in disgust over the abuse of peasants on his family's land. Both men fall for the same lady, Lucie Manette, who is pure and rather boring and gravitates towards the upright Charles. Elizabeth Allan looks appropriately fair and vacuous as the Hollywood Lucie, but I prefer the British Dorothy Tutin as a cuter, more approachable heroine.

Carton is played in the 1935 film by the elegant Ronald Colman, who initially appears ill suited for the part but quickly uses his presence to show how the (anti)hero epitomizes wasted potential. Looking upon Lucie and Charles he sees the happiness he has squandered, and it wounds him to the core. His involvement with these unwitting tormentors results from intrigue involving Lucie's father, who spent 18 years unjustly imprisoned in the Bastille, and the wife of a French wine-seller who yearns to spill Charles' blue blood and the blood of all oppressors of the people. This woman, Madame Defarge (Blanche Yurka), and her sidekick "The Vengeance" are painted in all their Dickensian color in Colman's picture, as is Lucie's prickly yet devoted maid (Edna May Oliver). Such portrayals and allusions to Christmas and religious faith make this version feel truer to the source.

That said, the 1958 film offers a more intense romanticism which also derives from Dickens' pen. Leading man Dirk Bogarde has a dark sex appeal reminiscent of James Dean. (It struck me as I watched him that nowadays such bad boys often get the girl. Dickens understood the pull of such a character even if he denied the possibility of him besmirching the central female.) Bogarde's Sydney Carton mopes outside Lucie's window at all hours and once, with tears in his eyes (and a lot of alcohol in his veins), proclaims his hopeless love to her face. His declaration happens in the book but not the other movie, and it adds poignancy to the monumental decision to come. This occurs when Charles, returning to Paris to aid a friend, is thrown in jail and sentenced to meet the guillotine. Only the intervention of a man with nothing to lose and a desire to gain meaning in someone's heart can foil the wrath of the French mob.

Both movies honor Dickens' genius by concluding with Carton's famous words, "It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done…." Endings do not get any more classic than that. And literary adaptations are rarely more stirring than these two films.

Copyright © 2010 The Jujube (M. I. Kim). All rights reserved.