Film Reviews

Vanity Fair

• Rating:
• Director: Mira Nair.
• Starring: Reese Witherspoon, Eileen Atkins, Jim Broadbent, Gabriel Byrne, Romola Garai, Bob Hoskins, Rhys Ifans, Geraldine McEwan, James Purefoy, Jonathan Rhys-Meyers.
• Details: US/ 141 mins/ (12A).

Detail: US/ 141 mins/ (12A).
A lavish adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's 1847 novel, Vanity Fair sees Reese Witherspoon playing one of the classic anti-heroines of literature, Rebecca Sharp. Living up to her surname, Rebecca is orphaned at an early age, but that doesn't prevent her from making a concerted effort to upgrade her social status. After leaving a tough boarding school with her best friend Amelia Sedley (Romola Garai), she embarks on a lifetime of improving her standing in society. Becky's helped by her association with Sir Pitt Crawley (Bob Hoskins) whose family she works for as governess, and whose eldest son, Rawdon (James Purefoy), she marries in secret. This doesn't exactly endear her to the rest of the family - wise to her intentions - yet Becky's determination to improve her class knows few boundaries. Adequately compressing William Makepeace Thackeray's vicious social satire into a movie - even one which last for an ass numbing 141 minutes - is an impossible task and Vanity Fair appears to lumber from one dramatic incident to the next with little sense of preparation. Director Mira Nair (tipped to helm a forthcoming Harry Potter) tries to mask the screenplay's shortcomings in a blaze of colour and immaculate production design, but Vanity Fair feels a little too rushed, too cluttered to successfully evoke the moral at the heart of the novel. Still, Witherspoon, feisty as always, weighs in with another sparky turn, while Eileen Atkins playing a wealthy sarky spinster is simply wonderful.

Review by Garreth Murphy