Madame Bovary (2000)

Directed by: Tim Fywell | 150 minutes | drama, romance | Actors: Frances O’Connor, Hugh Bonneville, Eileen Atkins, Desmond Barrit, Adam Cooper, Hugh Dancy, Jessica Oyelowo, Trevor Peacock, David Troughton, Joe McGann, Phillip Manikum, Stanley Lebor

“Now the carnal desires, the lust for money and the craving for passion melted into one and the same suffering”, wrote Gustave Flaubert in the nineteenth-century novel ‘Madame Bovary’ about its protagonist Emma, ​​portrayed by him as a modern woman who provincialism wants to escape. Right-minded feminists today would immediately have a nervous breakdown of the caliber of Aunt Sidonia, but Emma Bovary is a novel character and one who still manages to appeal to people, as witnessed by the two film adaptations that have been made in recent decades. The first, a solid but flat 1991 costume drama by Claude Chabrol, is all but forgotten, but this one, a two-part BBC TV movie, gets on with it better. The ‘Beeb’ made an accessible and romantic ‘Madame Bovary’ with Frances O’Connor (‘Mansfield Park’) as beautiful Emma. With a British touch, yes, but Flaubert can rest assured: he would like to pour out his desire at Frances O’Connor’s garden gate and his Normandy is beautifully portrayed.

Romance in (British) costume dramas has traditionally been a tricky situation; in the worst case it doesn’t get any further than differences in position expressed by means of wacky knee bends; in the twenty-first century we can at best become sentimental about this. The essence of romanticism, however, is unfathomable desire and dissatisfaction with everyday life, human traits that are timeless and cultivated by Gustave Flaubert down to the last detail – including his private life. Emma Bovary is his muse and anti-heroine, versatile and double-hearted; no predictable female adultery where a dull man quickly becomes the bitten dog and the ‘true’ lovers steal the show, but childish selfishness and dreams way too big. This is clearly shown in this production, without portraying Emma as unsympathetic.

The one hundred and fifty minutes pass quickly; it is therefore not a boring fare. The constructive dramatic developments are for part one, fate – that is Flaubert too – is for part two. The transitions from Emma’s childhood through marriage with lover(s) to death are smooth – perhaps a little too much, but this film adaptation also devotes sufficient attention to the inner contradiction between Emma and husband Charles, who is her natural opposite with his science-bound sobriety. ; Hugh Bonneville (“Notting Hill”) is a Charles you can’t hate and you have to. It is essential to show Emma’s imperfections.

Since ‘Madame Bovary’ also deals with the changing morals in nineteenth-century France – albeit that this theme has largely been sacrificed to the director’s keenness on Emma – Charles’ mother (Eileen Atkins) who lives with the couple must also be mentioned. – a frugal sourpuss next to her prodigal daughter-in-law – and Emma’s peasant father (Trevor Peacock), from whom she inherited her boundless stubbornness. Greg Wise is a hunk who could be in pop group Spandau Ballet and Hugh Dancy (Léon) a classical dreamy student. Emma herself is played passionately and passionately by Frances O’Connor, a relief after the cool Isabelle Huppert in the Chabrol film adaptation. Of course Flaubert’s intention has been to give fate a major role in the life and actions of a novelist who hopes to find happiness through the constant pursuit of passions, but there is music and humanity in Emma Bovary; it’s not just a psychiatric case—at least not in the bulk of the work; that zest for life is well displayed by Frances O’Connor.