Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day

[osprey_archer]

I have a theory about book to movie adaptations. A great book can be adapted into a good movie, but that movie - even if it's six hours long and contains Colin Firth - will inevitably be lesser than the book, which is too dense to be translated onto the screen. A merely good book, on the other hand, can be transposed into a great movie.

Thus it is with Winifred Watson's Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day.

The book rips breathlessly through the day that the shy and retiring Miss Pettigrew accidentally gets swept into the orbit of sweetly ditzy party girl Delysia Lafosse (and her many lovers). The contrast with Miss Pettigrew's previous lonely live as a governess giving it just enough shade to redeem the book from pure candy floss as it skips across its story as bright and light as a dragonfly.

The movie is even better.

Partly this is because the book has gotten quite dated. The movie quietly drops some comments about Jews and Italians, but the biggest change - and an entirely salutary one - concerns the character of Delysia's lover Michael.

Watson describes him as "a Clark Gable of a man" who storms into Delysia's apartment and gives her a good hard shaking. Miss Pettigrew, witnessing this performance, all but swoons: such a glorious brute! so forceful and masterly! just perfect for Delysia.

The masterful brute seems to have held quite a currency in the 1930s. And 40s. And 50s. I really do not see the appeal.

The filmmakers, likewise not bowled over by Michael's masterful manhandling of his lady love, left out that scene entirely. Michael is the right man for Delysia, in this version, not because he's a semi-abusive Clark Gable wannabe, but because he alone of her lovers knows that she has others, and nonetheless adores her.

Michael in the book does not know. Michael in the book would probably blow a gasket. The book's attitude toward sex and vice is the forefront of thirties modernity: a blithely carefree surface buoyed by deceit, the deceit even more depressing because apparently inevitable.

It's this undercurrent of deceit that the movie-makers remove: the right relationships are those that are honest, even when the glittering surface is removed. But what a surface! There are nightclubs to visit - cocktails to drink - slinky sequined dresses to wear - a grand piano, with movie!Michael at the keys. And he's played by Lee Pace!

But as much as I adore Lee Pace (and Amy Adams, who plays Delysia), it's Miss Pettigrew herself who makes the movie great. Her seemingly humdrum character simultaneously grounds the action and makes it more piquant, as everything glitters more brightly in her starstruck eyes; and her romance, less dramatic yet more unusual than Michael and Delysia's, is all the sweeter for coming late.

Comments

[konstantya.livejournal.com]

I vaguely remember hearing about this movie when it came out, but didn't actually look into it much. I think I'll have to change that now, because it sounds terribly enjoyable. (Pragmatic changes, oh how I love you!)

And while we're on the topic of decent/good books that make fantastic movies, have you ever seen the BBC miniseries North & South? If not, it seems like it would be right up your alley. (I admit, your recent post about Emma got me thinking about this 1-2 month period in college where I binged on BBC miniseries, N&S being one of them. And now I want to do it all over again, damn you. XD)

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

Do! Do watch it! It's awesome!

And I seem to be in the middle of my own nineteenth century novel miniseries binge (I just saw Masterpiece Theater's Jane Eyre. I must post about it), so clearly I must add North & South to the list.

Is the book worth reading, do you know? I loved Gaskell's Cranford but all her other books are SO LONG that I don't want to just jump in.

[konstantya.livejournal.com]

The book is probably worth reading, especially if you're a "purist," so to speak, who likes to read/see/hear the original, but, well...it's one of those weird situations where, even in literary circles, the movie/miniseries is typically considered superior. The book is by no means bad, but it has some noticeable flaws--some events seem contrived, Gaskell arguably borrows too much from Austen without quite enough skill to pull it off, etc.--but overall it's more enjoyable than not. I found the read ever so slightly tedious/disappointing, but that could just be because I went to read it after I had watched the miniseries, and I went in with the (usually obvious) expectation that the book would be even better. If I had done it the other way around, and read the book first, I might have fangirled over it more. As it was, I liked it, but it didn't leave some great impression on me that other classics have.