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LOLITA Send This Review to a Friend
Thanks to Samuel Goldwyn Films, director Adrian Lyne's new version of LOLITA has been assured national theatrical distribution following its cable television Showtime presentation. Goldwyn and Showtime both deserve tribute for defying the pattern of fear that gripped others worried about a backlash from the censorship-minded. For a while it looked as if no U.S. theatrical distributor would come forward. I caught up with "Lolita" in London, where it was already in theaters despite some initial controversy.
How good is the film? First, let's say that Lyne has made a serious attempt to faithfully portray the drama of a man obsessed with young girls, in particular a 12-year- old, based on the much-lauded classic 1957 novel by Vladimir Nakokov. Comparisons with Stanley Kubrick's1962 film version are inevitable. The truth is that both Kubrick and Lyne suffered from their inability to capture what was most striking about Nabokov's work--his magnifcent prose. His brilliant use of the English language gave the novel its luster.
Kubrick achieved the larger-than-life quality needed to reflect the satire inherent in the book by casting Peter Sellers as Quilty, the interloper who steals Lolita from the obsessed Humbert Humbert. Lyne's version, with an intelligent, witty screenplay by Stephen Schiff, is more direct and expansive, and some ways more faithful to the book. But James Mason as Humbert was far more dynamic than Jeremy Irons's current heartfelt but less exciting performance. As for Lolita, Kubrick faced his own censorship problems that led to the casting of Sue Lyon, more the teenage vixen than the nymphet described by Nabokov. Dominique Swain is younger--although still not young enough--and is a better actress. She does convey the mix of a childlike spoiled brat who is sexually aware and has the tyrannical, manipulative ability to control a vulnerable adult. Melanie Griffith is a washout in comparison with Shelley Winters's superb performance as Lolita's desperate, tragic mother in Kubrick's film.
Despite the undercurrent of distorted sexual desire that leads to taboo relations, those looking for prurient scenes will not find them. Ironically, the only blatant nudity we see occurs when Humbert is in the process of chasing and repeatedly shooting Frank Langella as the lecherous Quilty. Langella's open bathrobe reveals a limp Quilty exposed in the film's only gratuitous, completely tasteless moment.
Nabakov's book is about so much more than a sexual obsession with nymphets. It holds a mirror to society as it mocks cultural pretentiousness in America, twits the way we look at youth, makes fun of repressed attitudes and hypocrisy and satirizes Americana ranging from highway motels to summer camps, all achieved with great writing.
I have to say that Kubrick's film was the more effective if not entirely successful attempt, and far more enjoyable, yet Lyne's film is interesting and well worth seeing. As for those who become apoplectic at the mere thought of its content, they need to see the film even more than the rest of us. A Samuel Goldwyn Films release.
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