Darling (15.)
Directed by John Schlesinger. 1965.
Starring Julie Christie, Dirk Bogarde, Laurence Harvey. 122 mins. Out on Blu-ray and Dvd, part of Studiocanal's Vintage Classics Collection.
Darling, you were simply marvellous – fifty years ago. That's the thing about sixties artifacts, they are either eternal marvels or became cringe-worthy after a week. Darling isn't cringe-worthy, but its relevance and vitality got mislaid at least four decades ago and its look at the decadent amorality of swinging sixties London doesn't have much to offer these days beyond nostalgia. It's all knickers but no fur coat.
Darling wasn't quite Christie's breakthrough (she had been in Schlesinger's Billy Liar two years previous) but it was her first star role; won her an Oscar for best actress and the role of Lara in Dr Zhivago. Frederic Raphael's script is a kind of female Alfie, with Christie's Diana Scott sleeping her way to success as a model/ actress trading in a dull husband for a sophisticated TV producer (Bogarde) and then moving on to a callous, bisexual advertising man (Harvey.)
The films opens with an enormous image Christie's face being pasted up over a poster for World Hunger Relief showing pictures of starving African faces. It's a blunt opening metaphor and the film never shies away from bellowing what might more productively be spoken. It also neglects to tell the story properly. The film shows us that she has risen from relatively humble background to become a household name but aside from the odd advertising campaign and a brief film role we never actually see how she achieves this rise. It also seems terrible angry about something but Christie's selfish behaviour isn't really enough to get quite so indignant about.
Nothing ages faster then savage condemnations of the superficiality and shallowness of your times. No matter how crass the excesses and indulgences of your time were, the following generation it will always manage to lower the bar.
These days most people would probably concede, reluctantly possibly, that the social revolutions and upheavals of the Sixties didn't really advance society that much. Darling is in theory quite prescient on that score but it plays like a lucky guess. Rather than praising its prescience you resent it sullenness – who needs a glum, kitchen sink La Dolce Vita?
Directed by John Schlesinger. 1965.
Starring Julie Christie, Dirk Bogarde, Laurence Harvey. 122 mins. Out on Blu-ray and Dvd, part of Studiocanal's Vintage Classics Collection.
Darling, you were simply marvellous – fifty years ago. That's the thing about sixties artifacts, they are either eternal marvels or became cringe-worthy after a week. Darling isn't cringe-worthy, but its relevance and vitality got mislaid at least four decades ago and its look at the decadent amorality of swinging sixties London doesn't have much to offer these days beyond nostalgia. It's all knickers but no fur coat.
Darling wasn't quite Christie's breakthrough (she had been in Schlesinger's Billy Liar two years previous) but it was her first star role; won her an Oscar for best actress and the role of Lara in Dr Zhivago. Frederic Raphael's script is a kind of female Alfie, with Christie's Diana Scott sleeping her way to success as a model/ actress trading in a dull husband for a sophisticated TV producer (Bogarde) and then moving on to a callous, bisexual advertising man (Harvey.)
The films opens with an enormous image Christie's face being pasted up over a poster for World Hunger Relief showing pictures of starving African faces. It's a blunt opening metaphor and the film never shies away from bellowing what might more productively be spoken. It also neglects to tell the story properly. The film shows us that she has risen from relatively humble background to become a household name but aside from the odd advertising campaign and a brief film role we never actually see how she achieves this rise. It also seems terrible angry about something but Christie's selfish behaviour isn't really enough to get quite so indignant about.
Nothing ages faster then savage condemnations of the superficiality and shallowness of your times. No matter how crass the excesses and indulgences of your time were, the following generation it will always manage to lower the bar.
These days most people would probably concede, reluctantly possibly, that the social revolutions and upheavals of the Sixties didn't really advance society that much. Darling is in theory quite prescient on that score but it plays like a lucky guess. Rather than praising its prescience you resent it sullenness – who needs a glum, kitchen sink La Dolce Vita?
