A STUDY GUIDE by Paulette Gittins
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© ATOM 2013 A STUDY GUIDE BY PAULETTE GITTINS http://www.metromagazine.com.au ISBN: 978-1-74295-285-7 http://www.theeducationshop.com.au GREAT EXPECTATIONS (MIKE NEWELL, 2012). THE 2012 FILM OF THE CLASSIC NOVEL BY CHARLES DICKENS. WITH HELENA BONHAM-CARTER, RALPH FIENNES, JEREMY IRVINE, HOLLIDAY GRAINGER. A UNIVERSAL-SONY PICTURES FILM. DIRECTOR: MIKE NEWELL PRODUCERS: ELIZABETH KARLSEN & STEPHEN WOOLLEY SCREENWRITER: DAVID NICHOLLS. (AUSTRALIAN CLASSIFICATION/RATING: M (MATURE THEMES AND VIOLENCE) INTRODUCTION elcome to the very latest screen adaptation of Charles Dickens’ classic Wnovel: Great Expectations. Written in 1860, the novel has, to date, been made into a film version nine times, director Mike Newell’s offering being the tenth. Interestingly, when the first three versions, (1917, 1934, 1943) were released, there were people alive who could have read the novel in Dickens’ own lifetime (1812–1870). Audiences for 140 years have loved all the elements – thriller, ‘interweaving’ of the characters’ lives remains social comedy, gothic horror, satire, farce and love intact and clear. story. British reviewer Philip French has summed up Great Expectations has also been adapted Newell’s film as: into TV serials and stage musicals and has been plagiarised and updated by novelists and … reminding us what a fantastic, morally complex, scriptwriters, testifying to the universal appeal eternally relevant story (it is) … of good and evil, of both characters and plot. Dickens’ gift for the decency and generosity, snobbery and love, creation of larger-than-life characters, complex of dealing with forces beyond our control, of 2013 © ATOM SCREEN EDUCATION and intriguing plots and compelling and evocative accepting life and understanding the world. atmosphere certainly lends itself to the visual world of film. This Study Guide aims to explore the way in which Mike Newell treats this iconic classic, its Those of you (hopefully a great many) who have relationship with, and effectiveness in comparison read the novel will notice that one or two elements to, the original written text, its reception by a range of the plot have been removed in the film version, of film critics, and the connections we might make but the complex web of fate and irony in the of its themes and issues in our modern world. 2 FILM SYNOPSIS years, ever since being abandoned on her wedding day by her fiancée. Scrubbed, tidy and reluctant, The young protagonist Pip is to act as a companion to Estella (Helena Barlow), Miss Havisham’s beautiful twelve-year-old Ten-year-old Phillip Pirrip (Toby Irvine) – known for adopted daughter. the entire story as Pip – is visiting his family’s grave in his local churchyard when he is suddenly and This bitter, caustic woman, permanently clad in her terrifyingly seized by an escaped convict (Ralph ruined wedding dress, is training Estella to ‘break Fiennes) who demands food to eat and tools to file men’s hearts’, and Estella is already learning to be off his chains. With threats to his life, the little boy cruel in her taunting and belittling of the innocent obediently returns the next morning with the goods, Pip, who falls in love with her from the moment he but the convict, distracted by the nearby presence first sights her. Her jibes at his clothes and manner of another escapee whom he loathes, chases him now means he sees himself as a ‘clumsy labouring and thus is recaptured and returned to prison in ‘the boy’. His relationship with his once beloved Joe is hulks’ – the permanently moored ships in the nearby now in jeopardy as he fantasises about one day be- marshes, ships which act as prisons. coming ‘a gentleman’ so he can win Estella’s love. We are introduced to all the family Pip has: his Pip, the young man blacksmith uncle Joe Gargery (Jason Flemyng) and much older sister Mrs Joe (Sally Hawkins), who Ten years pass and Pip, now a young man (Jeremy is resentfully charged with bringing up Pip, and Irvine) and apprenticed as a blacksmith, is still liv- the pompous, foolish Uncle Pumblechook (David ing in daydreams. When Biddy (Jessie Cave), the Walliams). Life is harsh and poor for the Gargerys, kindly local schoolteacher, who has lovingly taught who have no expectations in their lives of anything him to read and write, offers herself as a prospec- better than their meagre existence; however, Joe is tive partner, he rejects her, his heart still yearning a contented man when at his work in the forge and for Estella. 2013 © ATOM SCREEN EDUCATION he and Pip happily anticipate the future, when Pip will be apprenticed to him as a future blacksmith. And now Pip receives the astonishing news from Miss Havisham’s solicitor, Mr Jaggers (Robbie Fate, however, intervenes. Coltrane), that he has ‘great expectations’ – he has an anonymous benefactor, someone who will pay Pip is invited ‘to play’ at the house of the eccentric for him to leave the forge, live in London and be- Miss Havisham, (Helena Bonham-Carter), a local come educated as ‘a gentleman’. Thrilled, he is con- gentlewoman who has lived in seclusion for thirty vinced that his benefactor must be Miss Havisham, 3 benefactor is not Miss Havisham, but is in fact Abel Magwitch, the escaped convict he helped as a child all those years ago. Escaping from the life of a convict in New South Wales, where he has grown rich, Magwitch has returned to England under pain of death to see and admire his creation – his ‘gentleman’. Pip’s money, his aspirations and his sense of self are now tainted by the connection to a violent criminal. Appalled, he determines to rid himself of the convict’s financial support, but out of compassion, he and Herbert plan to spirit him out of England to safety. In another flashback, we are given Magwitch’s harrowing history, of a wife and child both dead of poverty and disease, of being tricked, in the past, although he is forcefully ordered by Mr Jaggers into stealing from an innocent young woman by a never to ask or inquire of anyone he suspects of this wicked companion, known as Compeyson. Now, financial support. He now sees his childhood hopes of course, Pip knows that his beloved Estella is fulfilled; now he can become the sophisticated Magwitch’s daughter; the convict has been lied KEY CAST young man of his dreams; now he can win Estella. to by Jaggers about her supposed death. And In alphabetical order: Obedient but nevertheless convinced, he departs to Compeyson, we observe, is still alive and stalking London, where his ‘education’ begins. Magwitch, for a presumed reward from the law. ♦ HELENA BONHAM- CARTER: MISS HAVISHAM Pip’s new life mostly involves drunken parties in The attempted escape is a disaster. The small boat a newly joined ‘gentlemen’s club’ known as ‘The in which Magwitch is travelling to board an interna- ♦ RALPH FIENNES: Finches of the Grove’, overspending of the gener- tional vessel is waylaid; Compeyson is in another ABEL MAGWITCH ous allowance provided him by his ‘anonymous’ boat loaded with police. A terrible accident results ♦ JEREMY IRVINE: PIP benefactor and a gradual evolution into a snob- in Magwitch’s near-fatal injuries; he is recaptured, ♦ JASON FLEMYNG: bish, foolish young man. re-tried and given the death sentence. He will not JOE GARGERY live to face this, and Pip, grieving at last for his ♦ ROBBIE COLTRANE: New-found friend Herbert Pocket (Olly Alexander) tragic benefactor’s fate, is able to tell him that his MR JAGGERS fills him in (through a flashback) on the history of daughter is alive, beautiful, and that he loves her, a EWEN BREMNER: Miss Havisham’s jilting on her wedding day and moment of great comfort for the dying man. ♦ WEMMICK how, through the assistance of Mr Jaggers, she came to adopt Estella, a child whose parents were Pip’s acquired wisdom. ♦ HOLLIDAY GRAINGER: presumed dead. ESTELLA Pip’s life as a ‘gentleman’ is now in ruins. Ill and ♦ SALLY HAWKINS: On Miss Havisham’s instructions, the beautiful penniless, he discovers that the loving, genuinely MRS JOE Estella, now a young woman (Holliday Grainger) ‘gentlemanly’ Joe has paid off all his debts at enor- ♦ DAVID WALLIAMS: is once more thrown together with Pip. Believing mous financial cost. Pip has learned a valuable life UNCLE PUMBLECHOOK that her plan has always been for them to marry, he lesson: social class is a superficial standard of value ♦ JESSIE CAVE: BIDDY incredulously hears her rejection of him, her dec- that he must look beyond in finding a better way OLLY ALEXANDER: laration that she ‘has no heart’, and is determined to live his life. Truly humbled and now aware of the ♦ HERBERT POCKET to live according to her adoptive mother’s tutoring. ungrateful snob he had become, Pip seeks employ- In horror, he hears of her plan to marry Bentley ment with his friend Herbert and the years pass ♦ BEN LLOYD-HUGHES: Drummle (Ben Lloyd-Hughes), a violent and ar- peacefully, until one day he finds Estella again. BENTLEY DRUMMLE rogant brute, although Pip desperately warns her ♦ HELENA BARLOW: that this dangerous man has no heart. The years have been unkind to her at the hands of YOUNG ESTELLA the vicious Bentley Drummle, who has died in an ♦ TOBY IRVINE: YOUNG Pip’s devastating awakening accident resulting from his ill-treatment of a horse. PIP But Estella has never forgotten Pip and tells him ♦ CHARLIE CALLAGHAN: For Miss Havisham, her training of Estella has she has been ‘bent and broken, but, I hope into a YOUNG HERBERT a disastrously ironic consequence; not only has better shape’.