Artivels Undescribable Perfection

Stevecorp Don't listen to the negative reviews

Salubfoto It's an amazing and heartbreaking story.

Roman Sampson One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

homespun13 I normally love period dramas, particularly those that enable me to "travel in time" to another time and place and experience, for a moment, what life was like in those times. I also like movies with an English/Scottish/Irish setting, so I looked forward to seeing this movie. Sadly, I was disappointed. I did not read the book this movie was based on, but based on reading the reviews here, I get the picture that the movie hardly resembled the book. Much of the plot did not make sense - this must have been the parts that the movie makers changed from the original. When plot does not make sense, the movie loses credibility. The performances were fine, but in general I felt that great talent had been wasted or not utilized to its potential. The movie features some really good actors who deliver good performances, but it's not enough to compensate for the inconsistencies in the storyline and what appear to be historical inaccuracies. The relatively happy ending is about all that was enjoyable about this movie.

Jay Raskin The movie has excellent acting, excellent photography, excellent music and a fascinating story. The complaint that it is not the Daniel Defoe novel seems absurd: James Whale's "Frankenstein" is not Mary Shelley's novel, but it is still a great movie.Robin Wright, Morgan Freeman and Stockard Channing are all terrific as nearly everybody notes, but we should also give credit to Aisling Corcoran who plays Moll's daughter, Flora. She gives one of the most spirited and believable children's performances ever. It reminds me of Dakota Blue Richards' performance in "the Golden Compass." This film shows the tremendous hostility the upper class had towards both women and the poor in 18th century England. It is a good representation of the times. I show it as an example of the time period when I teach Humanities courses. It is also a great example of a strong woman character who develops her own moral standards. So it is especially recommended for teenage girls.

Genkem I have seen many bad interpretations of books, but this one takes the cake in that it bears NOT EVEN ONE piece of a shadow of a resemblance to the book it is supposed to be based on. It leaves one to wonder where on earth this story came from and why bother using the title "Moll Flanders" at all? Maybe the producers needed to do that in order to keep the money happy? I am flabbergasted, especially since I know and own the vastly superior Masterpiece Theater version starring Alex Kingston that is such a faithful and wonderful interpretation. (I highly recommend THAT version, if you can find it. It's out of print and the reworked 'Fortunes and Misfortunes of Moll Flanders' is a bit tampered with, though also OOP)Despite everything, I found the film, apart from the inexcusable deviations, enjoyable in itself. There are preposterous things that could have never happened in that century, which others have already gone into in their reviews, but the story and movie itself is not actually ALL that bad, and there is some excellent work by crew and cast...which is why I gave it some stars. The acting was superb, and the visuals and costuming were a real treat. Bravo to the actors and the costumers. Though overly sentimental and awkwardly structured, the story was serviceable and enjoyable, overall, too, if you allow a little liberty with the realities of the time period, and the ridiculous notion that the story was ordered to be told to the child.I do have a big complaint, as a visual artist myself, about the paintings that were supposedly the work of Moll's artist-husband. I hate to say, but the artists' paintings should have been much better executed. Though John Lynch's character was supposed to have been an artist who was struggling and always frustrated by his efforts, the execution of an trained artist of that time would have been more mechanically sophisticated, unless he was a primitive self-taught, which, given the well-heeled upbringing of the character, doesn't seem very likely, as lessons in the arts and sciences were common education for the wealthy of that period. The artist was meant to be struggling with the expression of the spirit and essence of the model, not the actual mechanics of the paintings. It is clear in the dialogue that he was struggling to express something finer and deeper about the model, which is more of a metaphysical matter. He says himself, when complimented on how good the painting is, that it is "all mechanical". I believe the designer and the scenic artists sadly misinterpreted the intent of this part of the script, or they just did not have the capabilities or resources to produce the right sort of paintings, which, along with a certain clumsiness in the script, makes the whole premise fall flat. It is too bad because it is one of the better parts of the story.I give this film four stars. If you enjoy films of this type, do yourself a favor and see the vastly superior Masterpiece Theater version of the book. You won't be sorry you did!

ferretboi Yet again Hollywood takes a literary classic and entirely reworks it. "The daughter of a thief, young Moll is placed in the care of a nunnery after the execution of her mother. However, the actions of an abusive priest lead Moll to rebel as a teenager, escaping to the dangerous streets of London." No, this doesn't happen at all. The novel she is handed off to family when her mother is sent to plantations a much more common sentence for criminals at that time when their crime was petty. Further when she was given to family of her mother she then made her way in to the hands of gypsies before being found in Colchester having run off and being taken in by the local Parish. Not "the streets of London" right off the bat. Completely different tone, I understand the need to revise a work for the screen as it may be unworkable from it's original form but this is just an example of another movie where they've reworked the material needlessly and changed the subject matter much to the detriment of the work making the character much more sympathetic. Sad thing is it's a habit of Hollywood that will surely not change.