Review: Howards End (1992)

Howards End is an almost stilfingly bland and at times confusing film that lacks a true spark, and in adapting the novel, creates a confusing and difficult to follow narrative, not helped by lackluster direction.

There are positives, since the acting is spot on through out. The shame is that, no matter how good the acting is (props to Vanessa Redgrave and Emma Thompson), the story is so complex, and the character motivations usually only alluded to, that I end up not really caring about anyone in the story. On top of that, most of the characters end up creating their own problems, and therefore loose sympathy for me.

James Ivory's direction is incredibly bland and uninspired, and his Oscar nomination is a total mystery to me. there's nothing particularly unique or inventive about his direction, and in a film that is almost mind numbingly static in it's story (a good 95% of this film is people talking), the lack of spark in the direction means that I became bored almost immediately. The film's pacing is also absolutely awful, dragging along it's 2 hour, 22 minute run time like molasses.

Another issue is that the screenplay seems to be slavishly devoted to following the book (which, admittedly, I haven't read). There are a good five or six separate plot lines, and a good half of them are completely unrelated to the central conflict over who gets to inherit the titular Howards End. You read that right. This movie's core conflict is over who gets to live in a country cottage. Nothing else. It's actually rather hard to explain the story, since it's so confusing and labyrinthine that I became hopelessly lost, and by the end of the film just end up scratching my head as to what happened and how Story Line A connected to Story Line B and how those two connected to Story Line C. There's so much going on, and so much of the dialogue is just British people being so insanely stereotypical in their Stiff-Upper Lip British mannerisms that at times I ponder if this film should have been done as a dark comedy, highlighting the sheer absurdity of the cultural mannerisms of the time. But nope, the film plays them straight, which leads to me, a normal middle class American from the 21st century, feeling deeply confused, and quickly realizing that almost every single conflict in this movie could have been avoided if everybody just stopped being so prim and proper.

Heck, even the music and cinematography is nondescript. Having a good moment here or there, but overall leaving no real impact. And that's ultimately what I took from this film: No real impact. I couldn't figure out it's message, if there was one, and watching a good half dozen plot lines run around the movie just left me confused.

So yeah, I find this film very, VERY overrated. It's stale, has no real spark, and even with it's good--heck, even great--acting, the story is so bland and direction so bland that it all just kinda becomes a boring, boring, boring film with no real life to it at all, either emotionally or visually.

1 star.