The Last September

A family of British aristocrats living in County Cork finds their comfortable lifestyle threatened by the Irish rebellions of the 1920s, when the headstrong older daughter develops a fatal attraction for a notorious local patriot (i.e. terrorist) with a price on his head.

This won't be the last film to dissect the bloodlust lurking just beneath the glacial politeness of upper-crust British manners, but the perceptive screenplay (adapted from a novel by Elizabeth Bowen) shows an unbiased lack of sympathy for either side of the conflict. Deborah Warner makes an easy transition from a theater background for her feature film debut, directing a first-rate cast (including Michael Gambon, Maggie Smith, and Fiona Shaw) with impressive, understated visual flair and an eye for the telling detail. The specific Anglo-Irish perspective could make the film a tough sell to American moviegoers unschooled in the social/political snake pit of Emerald Isle antipathy (here placed into an intriguing, almost tribal context), which may explain why the promotional trailers make it look like any other romantic melodrama in funny period dress. It's a misrepresentation likely to alienate the film's target audience, but discerning viewers should find plenty here to provoke their thoughts.

This is the only feature film directed by the well-known London theatre director, Deborah Warner. It is a pity she has not made more. She has a wonderful feeling for mood and atmosphere, and this film is soaked in it. The story is from a novel by Elizabeth Bowen and concerns the landed gentry known as Anglo-Irish who once inhabited grand mansions in southern Ireland (Eire) until the Troubles, when most of the mansions were burnt down (a great loss to architecture) by the 'republicans'. The film centres upon the great house and grounds of the Naylor family, and does not deal with the larger picture in Ireland. The remarkable Keeley Hawes starred in this film just before appearing in WIVES AND DAUGHTERS (1999, see my review), and as she began acting on television at the age of 13, she was already a trooper by this time, aged 23. There is no doubt that Hawes has always been, and continues to be a most impressive actress, as she proves once again here. In the story, the beautiful and skittish young Hawes has known since childhood a sinister young man who has now become an IRA killer, and she helps to conceal him in a local ruin, bringing him food and comfort. She does this despite knowing that he has just killed someone, fascinated by the evil of him and feeling no compunction because she likes the thrill and finds him sensually exciting. She lives with her aunt and uncle. The uncle is played with his usual expansive flair and mellifluous voice by Michael Gambon, while the aunt is played by Maggie Smith, who adds her lustre as always. An unexpected intrusion into the story is a visiting woman played by Jane Birkin, who adds a mysterious presence. An especially fine performance is given by Fiona Shaw, who effortlessly dominates scenes when she is in them. As Ireland and the characters of the story hurtle towards tragedy, we see a true 'end of an era', filmed on location in one beautiful rambling old house which seems to have avoided destruction. As visions of lost worlds go, this is a fine one, and the story is absorbing and beautifully filmed. The costumes were by John Bright personally, not just by his firm Cosprop. I remember him well from when he was just beginning, way back when, in yet another lost era called the sixties. The music is by Zbigniew Preisner, and is therefore highly superior, as is his wont. The film had no less than eleven producers, so many that they outnumber the main players in the cast. One is reminded of the 'Irish joke' which asks how many Irishmen it takes to change a light bulb. Never mind, wars can still be won when there are too many generals, as long as there is a good director on hand. This film deserves much more attention than it has had, and is a truly wonderful evocation of a time and place now lost in history.

Not everyone is familiar with the unique place of the Anglo-Irish in Ireland, and some of my companions expressed trouble following who was who, and how were they related. It took a while to get past this, I suppose. But the film itself is a compelling story of conflicting loyalties, misunderstood motives, and troublesome times. The juxtaposition of dinner parties and political violence was perfectly done. One of the most interesting "period pieces" I've seen, and of course, it's worth the price just to see Maggie Smith again.

The narrative is a mess but there are many fine visuals and isolated moments of deep emotional intensity. Michael Gambon and Maggie Smith were excellent, but Jane Birkin and Fiona Shaw have some of the most powerful scenes, with their relationship problems seeming to amplify the dislocation all the characters are feeling, Irish but not Irish, English but not English. However, it is Keely Hawes' intense performance as Lois that held the movie together for me, with her coming of age, and the relationship choices she must make, personalizing the larger conflict between English and Irish that the film wants to illuminate.

This is director Deborah Warner's first film (she's an experienced stage director) and I feel she relied too much on her cinematographer, Slavomir Idziak. He did a very fine job with the landscapes and interiors, but there are too many gratuitous camera tricks and heavy-handed visual cues that don't contribute anything to the story or it's impact. Overall, worth seeing for the performances and questions of national identity it raises. The interviews with Fiona Shaw and Deborah Warner on the DVD are also worth a look.

Having tried to read the novel on which this movie was based and not enjoyed doing so all that much, this film was an unexpected delight. While Bowen's style is often tedious, Banville's adaptation moves along at a sprightly pace that belies it's tragic, Chekovian subject matter. Like BBC's Persuasion and Vanity Fair, this film tries to rescue the period adaptation from the asphixiating clutches of Merchant-Ivory while retaing a large degree of textual integrity. Banvill, who brought the Irish "Big House" novel into the postmodern era with _Birchwood_ brings a contemporary eye to this tale of Anglo-Irish Aristocrats in the Last Days of their tenure. It's wonderfully acted, with Jane Birkin giving the sort of display of gap-toothed Anglo-Saxon diffidence that made _La Belle Noisuise_ tolerable; Maggie Smith doing her usual indignant aristocrat, Fiona Shaw playing Fiona Shaw, and Micheal Gambon thankfully playing an Anglo-Irish rather than Irish character. It's a film that anyone with a casual interest in Irish history will be enlightened by and one that anyone with an eye for beauty will be delighted by.