An English war widow, Florence Green (Emily Mortimer, gentle as a lamb), converts an old house in a small seaside town into her home and her livelihood: a bookshop, heavy on novels. In spite of her intelligence, she trusts everybody, which is a mark of innocence, but also of foolishness.
I don't know if Penelope Fitzgerald had Aesop in mind when she published "The Bookshop" (1979), but as adapted in this movie, her story boils down to his simple but haunting fable, "The Wolf and the Lamb." The moral: Tyrants take no pity on innocents. But while Aesop wrote a few terrifying paragraphs, "The Bookshop" takes almost two hours-- and undermines the moral because it's too busy cuddling the lamb.
When Florence is warned that the town dowager will stop at nothing to gain control of the house for her own purposes, does she take steps to protect her investment? No. She keeps doing business with her lawyer who, even in her credulous eyes, is a charlatan. She hires a slick opportunist, a man she dislikes, merely because he asks her to. In short, she's a patsy. A lot of good people are.
We're obviously supposed to admire Florence, even though her actions prove her to be imprudent, stubborn, and naïve. She's lauded for her courage, but courage without judgment is a formula for disaster, and dowager (Patricia Clarkson, more voracious than a wolf) is merciless. Unfortunately, like the evil dowager, Florence is one-dimensional: good. She met her husband (killed in WWII) in a London bookshop, where they organized the poetry section together. Poetry. Of course. Because history, biography, science, etc., don't reek of Romance with a capital R, which this tale does. Her first customer, posh Edmund Brundish (Bill Nighy), is an elderly misanthrope who becomes rather smitten with her, but stiff upper lips don't incline toward kisses.
However: Patricia Clarkson is terrific as the evil dowager, and she brings all her skills to the scene with Bill Nighy. Before admitting him to her manse for their showdown, she pauses for just a few seconds to prepare her reaction. There is no dialog-- i.e., elemental cinema. She merely stands, her beatific smile tinged with smugness, as she rehearses the ever-so-delicate gestures she will use on him-- a dismissive tilt of the head, an almost imperceptible shrug of one shoulder. Violet is revealed, so cold it gave me chills. An exquisite display of film as a visual medium.
I don't know if Penelope Fitzgerald had Aesop in mind when she published "The Bookshop" (1979), but as adapted in this movie, her story boils down to his simple but haunting fable, "The Wolf and the Lamb." The moral: Tyrants take no pity on innocents. But while Aesop wrote a few terrifying paragraphs, "The Bookshop" takes almost two hours-- and undermines the moral because it's too busy cuddling the lamb.
When Florence is warned that the town dowager will stop at nothing to gain control of the house for her own purposes, does she take steps to protect her investment? No. She keeps doing business with her lawyer who, even in her credulous eyes, is a charlatan. She hires a slick opportunist, a man she dislikes, merely because he asks her to. In short, she's a patsy. A lot of good people are.
We're obviously supposed to admire Florence, even though her actions prove her to be imprudent, stubborn, and naïve. She's lauded for her courage, but courage without judgment is a formula for disaster, and dowager (Patricia Clarkson, more voracious than a wolf) is merciless. Unfortunately, like the evil dowager, Florence is one-dimensional: good. She met her husband (killed in WWII) in a London bookshop, where they organized the poetry section together. Poetry. Of course. Because history, biography, science, etc., don't reek of Romance with a capital R, which this tale does. Her first customer, posh Edmund Brundish (Bill Nighy), is an elderly misanthrope who becomes rather smitten with her, but stiff upper lips don't incline toward kisses.
However: Patricia Clarkson is terrific as the evil dowager, and she brings all her skills to the scene with Bill Nighy. Before admitting him to her manse for their showdown, she pauses for just a few seconds to prepare her reaction. There is no dialog-- i.e., elemental cinema. She merely stands, her beatific smile tinged with smugness, as she rehearses the ever-so-delicate gestures she will use on him-- a dismissive tilt of the head, an almost imperceptible shrug of one shoulder. Violet is revealed, so cold it gave me chills. An exquisite display of film as a visual medium.