A Room With a View is set in the Edwardian age and concerns a respectable but inwardly adventurous young woman named Lucy on holiday with her chaperone in Italy. While there, she meets and is attracted to a young man who is not only of a different social standing but whose father is a socialist. Lucy gets engaged to another man, Cecil, who is outwardly suitable but emotionally incompatible with her. The first young man, George, shows up in Lucy's village back home, and she is faced with the problem of deciding whether to honor her attraction to a young man who loves her or take the conventional route of marrying the respectable but insufferable Cecil.
The theme of the story is authenticity, or the lack thereof, as it relates to passion and love. In Lucy's world, passion is a disreputable thing, especially if paired with unconventionality. Many of the people around her feel that appearances are more important than truth, and Lucy partly believes this herself; the main reason for her engagement seems to be a wish to protect herself from a strong vein of emotion that she recognizes, fears, and is encouraged to discount. Her decision to break her engagement and trust her feelings for George is a tremendous act of rebellion.
The 2007 TV movie goes further than the lovely 1986 Merchant-Ivory film by including a coda dimly inspired, apparently, by Forster himself but not included in the version of the novel I read. Instead of ending with the newlyweds in Florence, the TV movie concludes with Lucy alone in Italy, George having died in World War I. The revelation of George's death comes as a shock, and the reason for the film's introduction, in which actress Gillian Anderson rather chillingly invites viewers to decide for themselves whether letting Italy "change your life" is a good thing or a bad thing, is finally clear if no less strange. Are we supposed to think Lucy would have been better off if she'd never met George?
I take it that the more modern version of the story is attempting to tamp down the romance with a dose of reality: this is what happens once they live "happily ever after." It's true that George, in real life, would have been likely to meet such a fate, and in a way I admired the gumption of this production. On further reflection, though, it began to seem as if tacking a second story with a different emotional vibe onto the first one had more to do with shock value than realism. The beginning and end of the story don't seem to match; however, I can see that someone coming to this film knowing nothing of its antecedents might not see a disconnect. It might become, for that person, a different story, a darker one about the uncertainty of life, not an ode to being true to yourself. In the 21st century, we're supposed to be over those old hang-ups, so perhaps this film wanted to be about something else.
Before Midnight induces a similar cognitive dissonance in its look at two lovers who met on a train in their youth, reunited nine years later, and nine years further on are the parents of twins, weighted down with worries over kids and careers but apparently still happy. The first two films in the series were wistful, cheery, and romantic. There are a few signs in the third movie of darker undercurrents in the relationship, but overall the film maintains a gentle, humorous approach to its protagonists until a final, protracted fight scene in which resentments boil over into ugly words, venom, and incompatible viewpoints.
Holy mackerel! Personally, I've never had a fight like this one, but I'm sure many long-time couples would say it's realistic. Evidently, a decision was made with this film to brings things out of soft focus and into the nitty gritty, but the difference in tone between this and the first two films is a bit shocking. I'm surprised the script didn't find a way to explore the tensions inevitable in a long-term relationship with a bit more humor in keeping with the élan of the earlier films. Even fighting can be funny, but here the two people actually become unlikeable, and one is left not really caring if they stay together or not. It's not the movie you think you're going to see.
So, is romance dead in the edgy new light of the 21st century? Are we supposed to believe now not that it's everlasting but that it never lasts? Of course, it depends on the people and the circumstances, but I would take a less harsh view than either of these two films. Is it "better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all"? I think most people would still say "yes." I don't know that I'd ever say "happily ever after," but I would say "it's up to you." Isn't romance simply an opening?
So, is romance dead in the edgy new light of the 21st century? Are we supposed to believe now not that it's everlasting but that it never lasts? Of course, it depends on the people and the circumstances, but I would take a less harsh view than either of these two films. Is it "better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all"? I think most people would still say "yes." I don't know that I'd ever say "happily ever after," but I would say "it's up to you." Isn't romance simply an opening?
