George Eliot is widely regarded as one of the greatest novelists in the history of English literature, yet she is undiscovered country as far as the cinema- on both sides of the Atlantic- is concerned. Believe it or not, "The Mill on the Floss" is one of only two English-language feature films based upon her writing. The other is "A Simple Twist of Fate" from 1994, which took the basic plot of "Silas Marner" and transferred it from 19th century England to contemporary America. (There were several adaptations of her novels during the silent era, and a Spanish-language version of "The Mill on the Floss" was made in Mexico in 1940). This neglect of Eliot may be due to the length and complexity of her novels, making them more suitable for adaptations as television series, but length and complexity have not deterred film-makers from tackling many other 19th-century novelists. (Think how many films have been based on the work of Charles Dickens).
This website describes the story as "Romeo and Juliet in 1930s England", which is not really accurate. The film may have been made in the 1930s, but it is set around a hundred years earlier. The comparison with "Romeo and Juliet" is only partially accurate. The story may feature two lovers from feuding families, but Eliot's plot is more complex than Shakespeare's.
The "Floss" of the title is a (fictitious) river somewhere in the East Midlands. The two lovers are Maggie Tulliver, whose father Edward is the owner of the titular mill, and Philip Wakem, the son of a lawyer. The feud between the families arises when Edward Tulliver brings a lawsuit against a neighbouring landowner over water rights and Philip's father, James, acts for his opponent. After losing the lawsuit and being made bankrupt, Edward makes his family swear to have nothing to do with the Wakems, which puts Maggie in the position where she must decide between her family- her brother Tom wholeheartedly supports their father- and her lover. The complexities arise when Maggie also finds herself attracted to another man, Stephen Guest, who returns and encourages her attraction, even though he is engaged to her cousin Lucy.
Eliot's story is a good one on the printed page, but it does not really work in the context of this film, possibly because it is less than 90 minutes in length and a longer running time would have been needed to do justice to all the complexities of the novel. The film is in black-and-white- in 1936 colour was an expensive luxury- and lacks the visual attractiveness of the modern British "heritage cinema" style normally used in modern adaptations of the Victorian classics. The acting is unremarkable, with possibly the best contribution coming from a young James Mason as Tom, something of a hothead and unreasoning in his hatred of Philip, who has never done the Tulliver family any injury, but nevertheless capable and possessed of his own sense of honour and integrity. One thing the film does surprisingly well is the recreation of the great flood at the end of the story; the cinema technicians of the thirties were more skilled in the creation of special effects than we sometimes imagine. (The fire scenes in "In Old Chicago" are another example). The film, however, has little more than curiosity value for modern audiences. 5/10.
