Lolita is a 1997 film directed by Adrian Lyne and was the second screen adaptation of the novel by Vladimir Nabokov. The film stars Jeremy Irons as Humbert Humbert and Dominique Swain (15 years old during filming) as Dolores "Lolita" Haze. Supporting roles are played by Melanie Griffith, as Charlotte Haze, and Frank Langella as Clare Quilty.
History of the screenplay
The first screen adaptation of Lolita was the 1962 version, directed by Stanley Kubrick. The screenplay for this 1997 version, far more faithful to Nabokov's novel, is credited to Stephen Schiff, a writer for the New Yorker, Vanity Fair, and other magazines. He was hired to write it as his first movie script, after the film's producers had rejected previous screenplays commissioned from the more experienced screenwriters and directors James Dearden (Fatal Attraction), Harold Pinter, and David Mamet.[1][2][3]
According to Schiff, "Right from the beginning, it was clear to all of us that this movie was not a 'remake' of Kubrick's film. Rather, we were out to make a new adaptation of a very great novel." Schiff stated that "Some of the filmmakers involved actually looked upon the Kubrick version as a kind of 'what not to do'" and quipped that Kubrick's film should have been called "Quilty," due to the prominent role of that character.[citation needed][4]
Plot summary
In 1947 Humbert Humbert, a European professor of French literature, travels to New Hampshire, in the United States, to take a teaching position. He rents a room in the home of widow Charlotte Haze, largely because he sees her adolescent daughter, Dolores (aged 12 in Nabokov's novel but seemingly slightly older in the film and variously called "Dolly" or "Lo"), while touring the house. Obsessed from boyhood with young girls of this age, whom he calls nymphets, partly because of an early sexual experience and tragic loss, Humbert marries Charlotte for the sake of access to her daughter.
Charlotte's untimely death, shortly after she discovers his preference for her daughter, frees Humbert to pursue a sexual and emotional relationship with Dolores, whom he nicknames 'Lolita'. The two travel the country for a few years, staying in various motels but eventually settling in a college town where Humbert takes a teaching job. However, Lolita's increasing boredom with Humbert, as well as her growing desire for independence, fuels a constant tension between them. Humbert's desperate affections for Lo are also rivaled by a more devious and experienced nymphet lover, the playwright Clare Quilty, who has been pursuing Lo from the beginning. Quilty's name and identity are at first unknown to Humbert, and when Lolita runs away to him, Humbert's search for her is unsuccessful.
Three years later, after a receiving a letter asking for financial help, Humbert visits the now 17-year-old Lolita, married to another man and pregnant. His love for her remains, in spite of her circumstances, but she refuses to return to him. He relents and gives her a substantial amount of money and information about her inheritance from her mother. He also discovers the name of his nemesis, Quilty, whom he hunts down and murders.
Critical reception
Many critics evaluated the film highly and appreciated aspects of it, though some tended to qualify their positive comments. For example, James Berardinelli praised the performances of the two leads, Jeremy Irons and Dominique Swain, but he considered Melanie Griffith's performance weak, "stiff and unconvincing"; he considered the film better when she no longer appeared in it and concluded: "Lolita is not a sex film; it's about characters, relationships, and the consequences of imprudent actions. And those who seek to brand the picture as immoral have missed the point. Both Humbert and Lolita are eventually destroyed – what could be more moral? The only real controversy I can see surrounding this film is why there was ever a controversy in the first place."[5]
The film was The New York Times "Critics Pick" on 31 July 1998, with its critic Caryn James championing it and saying, "Rich beyond what anyone could have expected, the film repays repeated viewings...it turns Humbert's madness into art."[6]
Writer and director James Toback lists it in his picks for the 10 finest films ever made, but he rates the original film higher.[7]
Commenting on differences between the novel and the film, Charles Taylor observes that "For all of their vaunted (and, it turns out, false) fidelity to Nabokov, Lyne and Schiff have made a pretty, gauzy Lolita that replaces the book's cruelty and comedy with manufactured lyricism and mopey romanticism."[8] Extending Taylor's observation, Keith Phipps concludes: "Lyne doesn't seem to get the novel, failing to incorporate any of Nabokov's black comedy — which is to say, Lolita's heart and soul."[9]
See also
Notes
- ^ According to Gale, in Sharp Cut, Pinter was paid for his work but asked to have his name removed from the credits, in keeping with his contract: "In November 1994 Pinter wrote that 'I've just heard that they are bringing another writer into the "Lolita" film. It doesn't surprise me.' … Pinter's contract contained a clause to the effect that the film company could bring in another writer, but that in such a case he could withdraw his name (which is exactly the case with [the film] The Remains of the Day—he had insisted on this clause since the bad experience with revisions made to his Handmaid's Tale script" (352).
- ^ Hudgins observes: "During our 1994 interview, Pinter told [Steven H.] Gale and me that he had learned his lesson after the revisions imposed on his script for The Handmaid's Tale, which he has decided not to publish. When his script for Remains of the Day was radically revised by the James Ivory–Ismail Merchant partnership, he refused to allow his name to be listed in the credits"; Hudgins adds: "We did not see Pinter's name up in lights when Lyne's Lolita finally made its appearance in 1998. Pinter goes on in the March 13 [1995] letter [to Hudgins] to state that 'I have never been given any reason at all as to why the film company brought in another writer,' again quite similar to the equally ungracious treatment that he received in the Remains of the Day situation. He concludes that though he never met Nabokov, 'indeed I knew "Lolita" very well and loved it.' " (125). Hudgins also observes that Schiff was brought in after the efforts by Dearden (October 21, 1991), Pinter (September 26, 1994), and Mamet (March 10, 1995) and that Schiff "has no previous scripts to his credit" (124).
- ^ In his 2008 essay published in The Pinter Review, Hudgins discusses further details about why "Pinter elected not to publish three of his completed filmscripts, The Handmaid's Tale, The Remains of the Day, and Lolita," all of which Hudgins considers "masterful filmscripts" of "demonstrable superiority to the shooting scripts that were eventually used to make the films"; fortunately ("We can thank our various lucky stars"), he says, "these Pinter filmscripts are now available not only in private collections but also in the Pinter Archive at the British Library"; in this essay, which he first presented as a paper at the 10th Europe Theatre Prize symposium, Pinter: Passion, Poetry, Politics, held in Turin, Italy, in March 2006, Hudgins "examin[es] all three unpublished filmscripts in conjunction with one another" and "provides several interesting insights about Pinter's adaptation process" (132).
- ^ "Stephen Schiff", The Charlie Rose Show.
- ^ James Berardinelli, "Lolita (1997): A Film Review by James Berardinelli". Colossus.net, Movies, 1998. The Internet Archive, 29 Jan. 1999. Web. 27 Mar. 2009. (Archived version.)
- ^ Caryn James, "Television Review: Revisiting a Dangerous Obsession", New York Times. New York Times Company, 31 July 1998. Web. 25 Mar. 2009: "Movie Review Lolita (1997): [check mark] NYT Critics' Pick: This movie has been designated a Critic's Pick by the film reviewers of The Times."
- ^ James Toback, "How the Directors and Critics Voted", Sight and Sound. British Film Institute (BFI), 2002. Web. 25 Mar. 2009. (BFI: Sight & Sound: Top Ten Poll 2002).
- ^ Charles Taylor, "Recent Movies: Home Movies: Nymphet Mania", Salon (29 May 1998). Salon Entertainment, 2000. Web. 25 Mar. 2009.
- ^ Keith Phipps, "Lolita", avclub.com. The A.V. Club, 29 Mar. 2002. Web. 25 Mar. 2009.
References
- Gale, Steven H. Sharp Cut: Harold Pinter's Screenplays and the Artistic Process. Lexington, KY: The UP of Kentucky, 2003. ISBN 0813122449 (10). ISBN 9780813122441 (13). Print.
- –––, ed. The Films of Harold Pinter. Albany: SUNY P, 2001. ISBN 0791449327. ISBN 9780791449325. Print.
- Hudgins, Christopher C. "Harold Pinter's Lolita: 'My Sin, My Soul'." 123–46 in Gale, The Films of Harold Pinter.
- –––. "Three Unpublished Harold Pinter Filmscripts: The Handmaid's Tale, The Remains of the Day, Lolita." The Pinter Review: Nobel Prize / Europe Theatre Prize Volume: 2005 – 2008. Ed. Francis Gillen with Steven H. Gale. Tampa: U of Tampa P, 2008. 132–39. ISBN 9781879852198 (hardcover). ISBN 9781879852204 (softcover). ISSN 08959706. Print.
- James, Caryn. "Television Review: Revisiting a Dangerous Obsession." New York Times. New York Times Company, 31 July 1998. Web. 25 Mar. 2009.
- Phipps, Keith. "Lolita". avclub.com. The A.V. Club, 29 Mar. 2002. Web. 25 Mar. 2009.
- Taylor, Charles. "Recent Movies: Home Movies: Nymphet Mania". Salon (29 May 1998). Salon, Salon Entertainment, 2000. Web. 25 Mar. 2009.
- Toback, James. "How the Directors and Critics Voted: US: Top Ten". Sight and Sound. British Film Institute, 2002. Web. 25 Mar. 2009.
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