tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29676463.post1462135903235324764..comments2024-03-29T14:45:32.326+13:00Comments on The Imaginary Museum: ShirleyDr Jack Rosshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/01805945600952222957noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-29676463.post-53693327096299925332020-08-09T22:54:40.057+12:002020-08-09T22:54:40.057+12:00I decided to see the movie, realizing that I haven...I decided to see the movie, realizing that I haven't seen a movie for years. I enjoyed the experience again. But overall I was not that keen on the movie. I knew it probably wasn't a 'portrait' of the author -- I didn't know about her husband or even if I was looking at a fictional person -- but whoever she was, great as she may have been, the personalities of both her and her husband repelled me. <br /><br />There was a good theme in the young woman, in a sense, becoming the protagonist of Jackson's novel. I felt for the young couple, just married and struggling. But I didn't expect 'a happy ending'. But I feel that the movie (with some clever moves) was insufficiently subtle. <br /><br />It was good in many scenes. But so is Christina Stead's 'Cotter's England'. It is a great book. But it is a great, terrible, bitter book. It is narrated mostly by an seemingly endless mad malicious monologue by one of the main protagonists. Others of her family are also horrible. The main protagonist keeps on at a young woman knowing she will drive her to suicide. The brother of that protagonist is strangely 'apart' (although he nearly gets through to one of those attacked by his sister in a beautiful part of the book). The end result is a horror story without the macabre per se, no ghosts or mysteries.<br /><br />But the protagonist is terrible, a monster. There are such: so it is true to what it is doing. Still, it knocked me for a six. But I still want to read more books by Stead.<br /><br />The book though, taken in totality, is a tour de force. <br /><br />Again, in 'Shirley' we have a manipulative monster, or a pair of them. There are such.<br /><br />The actors are all pretty good. <br /><br />I think this would have worked for me if the young couple had been stronger. The young woman is: but both are that, too young. <br /><br />People who are interested in the writer and in that genre and in interesting movies -- it is clever, it does have amazing moments -- they should watch it. I think I would need to see it a couple of times. <br /><br />I would say it is worth looking at as it will pique interest in the writer (it is not a true to life biopic at all as it seems Jackson had children0. But it has to be realised it is an almost stereoptypical picture of a mad (and bitter or conniving) "genius". It starts well, brilliantly. I also just read 'The Lottery' online. The reaction of the young woman to that story is, by the film makers, a coup. <br /><br />This is not to say this has put me off Jackson's books, and I agree many writers mix horror and detective fiction etc with the 'heavy stuff' -- and Henry James is a good example.Richardhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10272507198753290435noreply@blogger.com