Vera, a professional researcher on behalf of Mary Shelley
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Generally speaking, the film is remarkable in terms of costumes, backgrounds and atmosphere, which makes people seem to return to the sunless days in London at the beginning of the 19th century and the dark nights of heavy rain in Geneva. The lead actor Fan Ning also performed very well, and her eyes revealed something more profound and mature than her young face can carry: it is a kind of nobility in suffering, patience in pain and courage to be loyal to oneself. The whole movie seems to be unremarkable, without twists and turns, even if there are twists and turns (eloped, the child dies), there is no musical and emotional rendering, but in fact, from the first scene of the movie, Mary is in the mother Wollstonecraft. From the beginning of reading in front of Te’s grave, the fragmentary plots and fragments are like falling pearls, and the creation of the novel "Frankenstein" in just a few minutes is like a strong line. Rope, put them on one by one.
The film mainly touches on four relationships: Mary and her mother Wollstonecraft, her father Godwin, and her husband Shelley, Claire and Byron. Mary's mother can be said to be the first feminist in the true sense of the West. In the movie, she is mentioned through Godwin's mouth: "Your mother is a warrior, and she is an enemy of everything in the world." The extraordinary bravery of her mother is the source of motivation for Mary's daring to embark on the road of departure from the world. There is also a mention that her mother pointed to Byron to show her a portrait of Henry Fuslei. It was a picture of a sleeping woman having a nightmare, and her dream turned into a terrible ape sitting on her. . In the picture, the women's slutty body, sloppy hair, and sly and evil faces of apes and monkeys are full of lust and violent hints. It seems that women are both the victims of being trampled and trampled, and they have also become the complicity of this abnormal relationship. Fuseli was Wollstonecraft's first lover (their feelings made her suffer a lot). This painting is actually a metaphor, that is, for a woman of the 19th century, what is their biggest nightmare? The novel then introduces two parallel relationships-Mary and Shelley, Claire and Byron. The former can be described as true love. The threat of the father's severing the relationship between the father and daughter, and the fact that the lover has a family are unable to extinguish the fire of love, but when Shelley's wife and Mary confronted each other, she had a sharp point of their future ending: "I eloped with him a few years ago," (look at me now, you can imagine you in the future). The love of a poet is like a cloud in the sky, like a moon in the starry sky, it is not useful. Forcibly implement the theory of "freedom of love", flirt with his sister Claire wanton, run away with her sick daughter in spite of the rainstorm, and leave a bunch of unresolved problems with his ex-wife and children....... All these make the sensitive Mary fall into helplessness and despair. When her loneliness and anger turned into a monster of vengeance, Shelley even suggested to change it to "an angel representing a perfect man." Mary's grievances and grievances erupted. She was amazed at the insulation between her lover and reality. She shouted, "Look at me!" In the end, Shelley admitted publicly, "I made her fall into the endless loneliness like Frankenstein's creation." Shelley couldn't understand Mary's huge pain, but Claire could. Although she is also one of the troublemakers in Mary's life, her own love tragedy made her empathize with Mary (and the monster), and her understanding is that she is also a female victim of sympathy. Compared with Shelley’s casual attitude towards love, Byron is even better. His narcissism makes him treat any lover’s love as a sacrifice he deserves. His moral blindness makes Claire. In his whole life, he has made atonement for his impulsive faults. Let's talk about Godwin again. He is not only Mary's literary enlightenment teacher, but also a shadow that summons monsters. He taught Mary to "find your own voice" and opened her literary dream. But when Mary ran into her father in the market after she eloped, her father treated her indifferently like the temperature of winter at that time. Just as Mary questioned her father: "We live according to your theory," but he denied his daughter's free love and broke off father-daughter relationship with her, the monsters in the novel were created by Frankenstein, but the same Abandoned mercilessly. (Of course, her father, as someone who came by, understands the price of putting the theory into reality without thinking twice. This is also his ambiguity.) Therefore, it can be said that the monster in "Frankenstein" is the nightmare in the painting, and it is Shelley's ex-wife. Suicide was the child resurrected in Mary’s dream, the author title she was robbed of, the back of her father who hadn’t seen him in a long time, and the back of Claire’s rainy night... Everything is no longer sloppy. Disorderly. But I humbly thought that there was a plot design that was redundant, that is, the part where Mary went to Scotland, if it was designed to meet Shelley there, it was unnecessary, because in fact, they met at Godwin's house. By the way, mention the poems that appeared in the movie: Shelley's "Queen Mab", Coleridge's "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner" and Byron's "She Walks in Beauty".
The above is the part of film reviews for ordinary audiences, mainly for the understanding and interpretation of the film itself. The next part is the spitting part of being a researcher of Mary Shelley. As a commercial product, film dramatization and good-looking are the primary goals, while authenticity will take the second place. In order not to allow everyone to misunderstand Mary Shelley, I will list a few main points that have been distorted by the film (the details will not be pursued)
1. Shelley and Mary met for the first time in Godwin's house and not in Scotland.
2. Mary knew that Shelley was married, because it was their husband and wife who went to Godwin's house to eat together. Perhaps for moral considerations, the director made Mary innocent. In fact, the death of Shelley's wife has been hanging in Mary's heart like a guilty weight.
3. Shelley was still an unknown poet until his death. The combined number of all his poems sold was less than Frankenstein's work. It wasn't until Mary edited Shelley's complete works in 1824 and 1839 that he gradually established his position. Therefore, the plot of a fan signature in the park is fake, and because he is famous, it is also fake to ask him to write the novel's preface. This leads to the most deceptive plot of the film-the problem of fighting for the rights of the work. After the novel was written, Shelley helped modify some words, wrote the preface, and contacted the publisher to publish it anonymously. Indeed, some people speculated that the book was written by Shelley, including the famous Walter Scott, but Mary wrote to Scott He clarified his misunderstanding humbly and politely. The so-called conflicts and cold wars between husbands and wives are all fabricated to fit the theme of feminism.
4. Clara was Mary’s third child. Her death was indeed due to Shelley’s recklessness, but he was not with Mary at the time. He asked Mary to take the sick child to Rome overnight for his own convenience. , So the child became more ill and died there.
5. Mary's character is also a misunderstanding. Fanning performed the firm, forbearing, and noble side of her character, but her other side was restrained and weak (her own evaluation of herself). The confrontation between Mary and her father in the movie, the fierce dispute with Shelley, and the bold challenge of Byron are all impossible things, although she may have done this countless times in her heart... Mary was not a feminist in her life. By. She said in the diary, "My personality determines that I can't write another "Feminist Defence". I always can't declare myself." "With regard to women's issues, I have never determined my own views. I don't think that removing all the restraints can guarantee the progress of society, and I always have to learn to deny myself." She certainly complains about the oppression of women, but at the same time she believes that in the face of the complexity of life, any slogans and theories are powerless, but the original guardianship and loyalty of love in women can keep one side happy.
Overall evaluation-Although it is not wrong to explain the birth of "Frankenstein" from the perspective of feminism through character experience, it also compresses the rich connotation of this work and Mary as a writer walks out of the ego with words A sense of mission to explore the truth.
above.
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