The novel was adapted into a film in 1970, starring Julie Christie, the 1965 Oscar winner, and British actor Alan Bates, who had participated in Doctor Zhivag. In 1999 it was selected as one of the 100 Best British Films.
The Go-Between begins with an autobiography of Leo, a sixty-something-year-old who was packing things in his mother's old house when he found a box in which his mother kept everything about him as a child. Opening the box that has been dusty for many years is like opening the floodgate of memory.
In 1900, 12-year-old Leo called "the Golden Age". At the invitation of his classmate Marcus, he came to Brandham Hall in Norfolk County. There he first experienced the aristocratic way of life, and secretly fell in love with it. Marcus' sister, Marian. Although Marian is about to marry Lord Trimmingham at the behest of her parents, she falls in love with sharecropper Ted Burgess. Unwitting Leo acts as a messenger for the two, traveling back and forth between Brandham Hall and the farm. This is also the origin of the novel's name.
The novel is based on Leo's memories, observing the world around him and the activities of adults through the eyes of a 12-year-old child. There are often long monologues and rich psychological activities in the book to help readers understand the behavior of the characters. In the film adaptation, these delicate and vivid words cannot be presented, and can only be compensated by the pictures. But in many cases, this kind of effort to fill in the blanks not only fails to achieve the corresponding effect, but confuses the viewer even more.
The most prominent is the episode interspersed with the old Leo returning to Brandham Hall to visit Marian. The gray-haired, dignified old man always appears at key points in the film, but there is only one back, like an off-screen ghost, silently watching the various activities of the people in the film. Not only is his appearance abrupt, it often interrupts the otherwise smooth plot, and most importantly, for viewers who have not seen the original, it is likely that they do not know who he is, because the film begins with Leo arriving at Brandham Hall and does not lead the way Old Leo appeared.
There are many such misunderstandings. For example, Leo and Marcus often play in an abandoned courtyard not far from Brandham Hall, where the poisonous plant Atropa belladonna (belladonna) grows. In the original book, this plant is a metaphor. Like the Marian, its flowers are beautiful and plentiful, inviting closeness but implying danger. Without the textual explanation in the book, the appearance of this plant in the movie is somewhat inexplicable, especially since the screenwriter specially matched its appearance with suspenseful music.
There are many such images in the novel. In Leo's eyes, Brandham Hall was very different from his somewhat shabby background, and the people here were like gods. Marian is the only woman in the Zodiac zodiac, the Virgin, Lord Trimmingham, with a scar on his face from a wound in the war, coupled with his noble family status and penetrating calm, Leo likens to Janus and Sagittarius Sagittarius, farmer Ted is a symbol of mature male in Leo's eyes, with healthy wheat-colored skin, outspoken, even a bit vulgar, but full of charm, so he is the Water Carrier, and he himself is Leo, the lion , Lord Trimmingham once said that Leo was the messenger in Greek mythology responsible for delivering messages to the gods.
It's a pity that none of these things were shown in the movie.
But in two other respects, the film does a good job of conveying a sense of sensuality that words cannot. For example, the film's presentation of summer in England permeates the plot everywhere. The low humming of bees in my ears while drinking tea outdoors, the hysterical chirping of Zen worms in the woods in the distance, the dark clouds hanging low in the sky before the afternoon rainstorm. In a way, this summer's heat is also part of the storyline. Since Leo arrived at Brandham Hall, the temperature has been soaring, and everyone's character has changed in this record-breaking heat. "One felt another person, one was another person."
Although there are mostly male characters in the film, the only two heroines, Marian and Brandham Hall's mistress, Marian's mother, Mrs. Maudsley, are absolutely dominant. Marian is young, beautiful, rebellious, arrogant, and Mrs. Maudsley wants to control everything, with the corners of his mouth always down, with a serious expression, angry at his daughter's rebellion. A string is always tense between the mother and daughter, as if a word or a look will break this delicate balance. When the two women were present at the same time, everyone around them acted cautiously.
Young actor Dominic Guard, who played Leo, won a 1972 BAFTA for his performance in the film. In the film, little Leo's face is always flushed red because of the hot weather, sweating slightly, and his brows are often wrinkled because of confusion. When British writer Ali Smith wrote about the experience of rereading the novel, he said, "A combination of knowing and not-knowing is this novel's driving force." Leo, who is about to turn 13, understands but doesn't understand the emotional entanglement between Marian, Lord Trimingham and Ted Burgess. Before that, his world was black and white, but after this summer, he officially stepped into the complex adult world.
Another connotation of LP Hartley's work is that he reflects the face-to-face collision of two social classes from the perspective of a child. Leo's family was not rich. After witnessing the luxurious and lazy life attitude of Brandham Hall, the immature Leo felt as if he had entered heaven and was on an equal footing with the gods. He was beginning to feel ashamed of his mother's embarrassment and stinginess, and the moment he put on the new suit Marian had bought him, he felt excited and conflicted as he degenerated into a member of the aristocracy.
This contradiction is manifested in his two different attitudes towards Lord Trimmingham and Ted Burgess at the same time. He is in awe of the former and desperately hopes to get his approval, while the latter, although more cordial, is because Ted Burgess calls him. Smirking for "Master Leo". There is a cricket match in the novel where the nobles from Brandham Hall play against a team of tenant farmers led by Ted Burgess. The author writes that it was not just "a conflict between Hall and village. It was that, but it was also the struggle between order and lawlessness, between obedience to tradition and defiance of it, between social stability and revolution, between one attitude to life and another." This game represents a development trend that is about to completely change the structure of British society.
But at that time, Marian and Ted's love across classes was still unable to escape the tragic fate. After being spotted by Mrs. Maudsley on a date, Ted returns to the farm and shoots himself. On his 13th birthday, Leo left Brandham Hall in shock and mixed feelings beyond words after witnessing the entanglement of his inner goddess and farmer Ted's body.
Fifty years later, the old Leo was relieved in his memories and revisited the old place. Facing the old Marian, he delivered a message for the goddess for the last time. Marian asked Leo to tell the story of her and Ted to her grandson who is also Ted's grandson. Edward, "Tell him there's no spell or curse except an unloving heart." This line, together with the opening of the novel, condenses into a classic.
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