Quartet

Literature cinema maestro James Ivory's 1981 Cannes admission, a film adaptation of Jean Rhys' novel QUARTET, as the name implies, it is a gamble with four participants, aka. two married couples.

In Paris, roaring 20s, the opening credits shift from one hotel to another, augurs the rootless fate of Marya Zelli (Adjani), a young and stunning beauty married to Stephan (Higgins), a handsome but self-interested Polish art dealer, who would soon be put behind the bars for his illegal deals, and leave Marya in penury out of the blue.

Then there is another couple, a wealthy middle-aged English art dealer H.J. Heidler (Bates) and his painter wife Lois (Smith), comes to Marya's rescue, although they only meet her once before, they insist that Marya should live with him under a ménage-à-trois fashion. Soon, we will know that Marya is not the first damsel-in-distress they timely lend a helping hand, a disreputable compromise has been mutually reached between Lois and H.J., as long as H.J. doesn't leave her, she will turn a blind eye on his affaire de coeur with young girls, even under the same roof, "we have a spare room in our apartment".

Marya is easily corrupted by the decadent lifestyle of the Heidlers and their expatriate clique, and after the tentative refusal of H.J.'s advances, she caves in after a bit but inwardly, she still hopes to leave with Stephan after he finishes his one-year sentence, financially dependent on H.J. and Lois, she is unable to make a clean slate even if she wants to. Meanwhile, Lois is also anguished about the inconvenient arrangement, wonders when H.J.'s infatuated phase will end, or this time, it could be herself that be superseded.

Men certainly don't look good in the story, when Stephan is released from the penitentiary, it seems that Marya has a tough call to make, but when everything is laid bare, she doesn't even have that option, on a less pungent note, Ivory invokes the misandry from Rhys' works, women are powerless, without exception, mistreated by men in their lives.

The narrative tweaks and jumps in an upbeat tempo, even when pathos should be evoked, the shot doesn't care to stick around, Ivory's formulaic direction banally basks in its silk-stocking milieu, the plush delicacy of its trimmings, with offbeat notification of a more risqué scenery. Luckily, the two female leads are as presentable as ever, Dame Maggie Smith (who would star in another film with the same name in 2012, a Dustin Hoffman elderly-skewing comedy QUARTET) rarely reveals her vulnerability in front the camera, showcases a master-class endeavour of breakdown which is needed to be GIFed. Adjani, impeccably gorgeous in her prime, and fluent in her bilingual dexterity, launches herself wholeheartedly in the torrent of trepidation, seduction, vacillation and desperation.

Alan Bates is miserly given a stage to justify H.J.'s eloquent equivocation in his immoral business, and Anthony Higgins, whose Stephan takes a back seat among the quartet due to his incarceration, however, flourishes in bringing out a more frank and unapologetic facade of his character although both Stephan and H.J. are equally bad eggs to their women, at least he manifests with a certain flair that's captivating and resolute. Finally, a footnote sends to Sheila Gish, who plays Lois' friend Anna and whose thunder has been stolen by that extraordinary-looking hippopotamus in the zoo. As one of the commodities from Merchant Ivory Productions, QUARTET doesn't represent the best collective results from the Merchant (producer)-Ivory (director)- Jhabvala (screenwriter) trinity, yet, a lavish take of Paris in the early 20th century is something not that common in their repertory, and a BluRay treatment should be taken into consideration in no sooner.

Few screenwriters have ever jumped the gap that Jhabvala traversed between THE EUROPEANS (1979) and QUARTET (1981). I know of no other film that captures as well the sense of European pre-WW2 'decadence' (compare CABARET for an object lesson in failure!), or that is directed and photographed with stronger integration of the settings, colours, sounds and behavior within the story being told. A remarkable achievement - the film that put filmmakers on notice about how well the remarkable Jhabvala/Ivory/Merchant trio present stories locked into their space and time.

While Quartet may be a lesser Merchant-Ivory film and is no Room with a View, Howard's End of Remains of the Day, it still has a lot to recommend it. It's not great and could have been better, but is decent.

Quartet for starters is beautifully made, as always the costumes and sets are amazingly sumptuous, is lit with a luminous atmosphere and shot with the usual exquisite charm. It's hauntingly scored too, and there is some intelligent scripting too that does have some poignancy and explores the contrast between upper class lifestyles and moral corruption suitably subtly. James Ivory directs with an appropriate amount of restraint, and there is some good acting here. Maggie Smith relishes her juicy character and her performance along with the production values is the best thing about the film. Anthony Higgins is sympathetic enough too.

Alan Bates' character could have been much better realised though, Bates succeeds in being charismatic but he is not intimidating or nuanced enough, Heidler is very one-dimensional and a character you feel nothing for from the get go. Isabelle Adjani is attractive but somewhat too cold and immature, which doesn't make the character's fear resonate. The dialogue is good here, but a better job could have been done with the characters, for they felt sketchily developed and their motivations rushed and unclear. Merchant and Ivory productions are always deliberately paced, but in their very best work the characters and their situations are really compelling and drive the story effectively, unfortunately because that was an aspect that Quartet was (for me) lacking in the pacing did feel a bit lagging and dull.

Overall, lesser Merchant-Ivory but a decent watch. 6/10 Bethany Cox

"Marya" (Isabelle Adjani) finds herself out on a limb when her husband "Stephane" (Anthony Higgins) is incarcerated for a year for some art fraud. Luckily (or not) she is taken pity on by "H. J." (Alan Bates) and his doting wife "Lois" (Maggie Smith). They invite her into their lives but quickly, she realises that he has a bit of a wandering eye and that though his wife is fully aware, she is too afraid of losing him to intervene. "Marya" doesn't welcome his attentions, indeed she makes it clear that she's not the slightest interest at all, but a combination of circumstances and her foreign birth (she is originally from the Caribbean) make it tough for her to find acceptance or a job. Despite repeated attempts to flee, she finds herself drawn more and more into his toxic manipulations - even once her husband is released from prison. "Stephane" is under no illusions as to the scenario and so now it's choice time for everyone who has got used to the situation and the lifestyle. Thing is, here, it's all so gorgeously filmed, costumed and designed but the delivery of the story is entirely sterile. Bates, especially when he tries to get emotional, is frankly pretty terrible and Smith's character is just so weak and feeble that she has little to get her teeth into the role beyond playing (well) a porcelain shadow of a woman. It's probably Adjani who disappoints most, though. She's as flat as a pancake with her performance, coupled with the rest of the lacklustre direction, presenting us with something that is very much a victory for style over substance.

Abandoned in Paris with no work permit and no savings, when her art-dealing (illegal) Polish husband is sent to prison, Marya Zelli (Isabelle Adjani) accepts the hospitality of the Heidlers, Lois and H.J.(as Lois invariably calls him) which, probably inevitably, involves her providing bed service to H.J. The video box describes the Heidlers as a "freethinking British couple" - if you can accept a couple, with such limited self-awareness and inability to talk through their problems, as freethinkers.

The film is based on the novel by Jean Rhys, based on her own experiences with Ford Madox Ford who presumably had more going for him than H.J., or else he wouldn't be in all those books on the literature of the twenties. Apparently Ford helped Rhys with her novel, and after he tired of her body got her a ghost-writing job on the Riviera. Rhys' husband was out of prison and had abandoned her before she moved in with the Fords. Presumably her major motivation was her devotion to her writing. Marya Zelli, in the film is not a writer, and she stays in Paris because her husband is still in prison. She says more than once to Lois that if given 100 Fr she would disappear (back to England where she could legally work?) but she gets 250 Fr just before moving in with the Heidlers when she sells almost everything she has to the hotel concierge.

Thus while the film is of the desperation of no choice, Marya has in fact fewer options than the real-life Rhys, and the film ending where Marya is thrown on the mercy of her husband's acquaintance from prison, is very bleak, unlike Rhys' fate of being ejected to a writing job.