But it did make me laugh that as she evolved into the love interest, Hester wore her specs less and less till eventually they disappeared altogether. I don’t know whether that’s more insulting to men or women, in truth. Of course, it was important in the film that Hester was beautiful because the decision had been made, in typical Hollywood style, to have Jericho and Hester fall in love, and women, as we know, can only attract a man by being beautiful – in Hollywood. I had an urgent desire to tell Apted that sticking a pair of specs on a beautiful woman does not make her plain – I thought we’d got past that stereotype around about the same time as we came out of rationing. Winslett, one of my favourite actresses, is way too beautiful to be Hester. One wonders why he has never been in love before, and also why he would have been naive enough to fall so heavily for Claire or believe that she had fallen for him. Scott is too old to be a man so thrown by losing his first love that he has a breakdown. While both Dougray Scott and Kate Winslett give fine performances, neither of them convinced me as the characters from the book. Dougray Scott, Saffron Burrows and Kate Winslett as Jericho, Claire and Hester As a result, the atmosphere that Harris creates in the book of a country struggling to survive, desperate for the supplies sent from the US on shipping convoys, never really materialises. The same applies to the cold – with coal rationing meaning that even indoors heating was barely adequate. The film mentions briefly the lack of normal foodstuffs, but gives no real feeling for the deprivations people were undergoing. Normally I’d appreciate this kind of visual treat, but the book shows a much bleaker England, where everything is cold and grey, where three years of war have taken their toll on the land and environment as much as on the people, who are tired and undernourished. England looks like a green and pleasant land. The first thing I noticed was how brightly shot and coloured the movie is. Unfortunately, this is one case where making a direct comparison worked significantly to the detriment of the film.
In my review, I described the novel as a masterclass in how to write a book, so the film had a high standard to reach.
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