Consequently, they’re left with no other way to limn their heroine’s interiority except by force-feeding the story, as to a goose reared for foie gras. It’s that distinctive voice, expressed through an adroit use of free indirect style, that earned the original work acclaim - not the bare-bones plot, which, when rendered down to its essence, is basically straight-up melodrama.īut the film’s venerable producers Elizabeth Karlsen and Stephen Woolley ( Carol, The Crying Game), Husson and screenwriter Alice Birch (author of Lady Macbeth, as well as the recent TV adaptation of Normal People and episodes of Succession) have elected to eschew the currently unfashionable device of voiceover narration, which would have offered some taste of Swift’s prose style. However, even the lush world-building of the visuals here, committed performances especially from Young, and stream-of-consciousness editing aren’t enough to conjure the wry, melancholy, and, above all, intensely literary interior voice of the book’s protagonist. Taken with her previous, sexy-time-rich portrait of young people in the throes of passion, Bang Gang: A Modern Love Story, this new film from French director Eva Husson (who also made misfire Girls of the Sun) further demonstrates an enthusiasm for refracting character through intimacy, especially from a largely female point of view. Venue: Cannes Film Festival (Cannes Premières)Ĭast: Odessa Young, Josh O'Connor, Sope Dirisu, Colin Firth, Olivia Colman, Glenda Jackson

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