A very, very late movie review - Barry Lyndon

I had noticed ages ago that Barry Lyndon was on Netflix, and I've lived in fear for months that I would check again when finally deciding to watch it only to find it had been removed.

But happily (sort of), I have been feeling a bit under the weather for a few days and decided yesterday to really rest properly, which presented the perfect opportunity to spent an afternoon in front of the TV.

In short, I reckon it's very good; much lighter in tone and more enjoyable than I expected.

Down memory lane for a moment - I think at the time it came out (1975) my mother might still have bought some long defunct movie magazine and I may have first read about it there.   (She didn't go to the movies all that often, but I think it was more a case of really liking to see photos of her favourite stars - such as Paul Newman and [especially] Robert Redford.)   So I have long known its reputation for painterly composition and leisurely pace.  The technical innovations that allowed for a lot of scenes to be shot in natural candlelight I perhaps read about later.   I also have long known it didn't exactly attract a big audience on first release.

It is considerably better than that reputation - although I can see how the downbeat ending (which I presume comes from the book) may have left audiences feeling a bit underwhelmed.  (Actually, the Wikipedia entry on it says that critic's views of the film have been revised upwards since it first appeared, so my positive feeling towards it is not alone.)

Most significantly, I think it's Kubrick's most realistic depiction of human character.   I've long said he seemed to have real trouble writing normal human behaviour and character, not that it meant his films could not be great for other reasons.   But there does seem to me to be a lot of ordinary humanity in much of Barry Lyndon, and it's pleasing to see.

One very obvious thing that keeps happening in the film (especially in the first half - or did I just stop noticing it so much in the second half?) is a gradual zoom out to show the larger vista.  I'm not sure what the thinking behind the repeated use is, but it is not displeasing.

Oh, that's right - now that I Google it, I think I might have watched this Youtube commentary (I'll link to it at a Reddit thread devoted to the topic) about this aspect of the movie years ago, and it has a really good go at explaining the significance of its use.   Sounds pretty convincing to me, and also makes me glad I'm not a student of film having to come up with my own interpretations of cinematic language and intent!

Other things the movie made me Google:

*  whatever happened to Ryan O'Neal?   I didn't  think he was too bad in the movie, even though it seems many critics felt the acting could have been better.  I had forgotten entirely what a troubled personal life O'Neal has had.  He's 77 and still with us, but both he and at least his son has had frequent trouble with drug use, sleeping around a lot and generally dissolute behaviour.   Looking back, it's actually easy to argue that he has followed something like a downwards trajectory of the character in the movie.

*  what about those stick on beauty spots wore by both women and men in the film?     There are several websites which explain their history and context:  this one is pretty good, and this shorter blog entry mentions that, apart from velvet, they could be made from mouseskin (!), and it also gives the secret code behind facial placement:

the middle of the forehead - dignified

the middle of the cheek - bold

heart shape to the right cheek - married

heart shape to the left cheek - engaged or committed to a lover

touching edge of lower lip - discreet

on nasolabial fold - playful

near corner of the eye - on the look out for a new 'friend’

beside the mouth - will kiss but go no further

And so on….

I wonder what the source of that information is, and whether obsessive Kubrick was ordering placement of the spots on his actors with some knowledge of its code.   (He was such a detail nutter, it would be no surprise if he was.)

*  I see from this lengthy essay that Kubrick cut down the book a lot, which apparently contains much more farcical and roguish behaviour of the title character than appears in the movie. 

So, go watch it if you've missed it and have Netflix.