"If you want to discuss the relationship between literature and film, one of the best examples is Julie Christie's "The Willows" - an adaptation of Monroe, one of my favorite contemporary writers." - Spanish director Almodóvar
2013 Nobel Prize winner for Literature, Canadian writer Alice Monroe is 90 years old. She focuses on short story writing and has published more than ten novels. She is known as "the master of contemporary short stories" and "the Chekhov of our time". ". Most of Munro's work is from a female perspective, writing the secret thoughts of ordinary people, and depicting the subtleties of fate—often tragically. She likes to build a huge net in her works, and the characters are connected to each other, forming a world of their own. Therefore, reading her works requires calmness and patience. In a short story capacity, Munro usually provides the imagination space of a full-length novel.
Monroe's novels have a sense of inexplicable complexity that makes it difficult to directly retell the stories she wrote. She once said, "The complexity of things, that is, the 'layers of things', seems to be endless." The jumping stream of consciousness narrative is the hallmark of Munro's novels, and time seems to be possible in Munro's pen. A toy that twists at will. The characteristics of psychological realism in his novels are also obvious, and psychological descriptions are often used to show the inner world of the characters. Therefore, the difficulty of adapting Munro's novels into movies can be imagined.
But there are always brave ones. Currently, at least three films are based on Monroe's novel. The Canadian film "The Willows and Flowers" (2006) was adapted from the novel "The Bear Comes From the Mountain", the American film "Love and Hate" (2013) was adapted from the novel "Hate, Friendship, Pursuit, Love, Marriage", Spanish film "Julieta" (2016) adapted from three novels in the novel series "Escape" ("Chance", "Hurry" and "Silence"). In terms of the effect of the film, "Away From Her" (original name "Away From Her", literally translated as "Away from Her") is the one most adapted to the style of Monroe's work, and its script, if not the original, is also the least altered.
The film, written and directed by 27-year-old Canadian talent Sarah Polley, was nominated for two Oscars for Best Actress and Best Adapted Screenplay. The theme of "The Willows", ostensibly about Alzheimer's disease, is actually about betrayal and repentance (or revenge). The elegant and noble Fiona (Julie Christie) and University professor Grant (Gordon Pinsent) have been together for more than 40 years, but the shadow of Alzheimer's disease begins to invade Fiona's life. She took the initiative to choose to go to the "Meadow Lake" nursing home for the elderly for treatment. After passing the 30-day quarantine period agreed in the nursing home, Grant saw Fiona again. To his surprise, Fiona no longer knew him, and she had a new "love" - patient Aubrey . They were inseparable and seemed so in love with each other. Since then, every time Grant visited, he could only watch the other side "sprinkle dog food", and he was in agony. At this moment, Aubrey leaves the nursing home and returns home, and Fiona is lost and disturbed. To make Fiona less upset, Grant went to Aubrey's wife, Marian, and hoped she would send her husband back to the nursing home. But Marianne had other plans - she didn't want to lose her house because of the high hospital bills. Grant finds out that Marianne has a crush on him, and he seizes on this to finally bring the "rival" back to the nursing home at the expense of having a tryst with her. Another reversal occurred - Fiona didn't know Aubrey anymore, she raised her arms and hugged Grant...
However, there is another clue hidden behind this story, that is, Grant's derailment in his youth. In the novel and the film, it is clearly explained through Grant's memories. Grant also retired early, with only a discounted pension. Therefore, readers and audiences have reason to wonder: Is there a performance component to Fiona's behavior during her hospitalization? Or, subconsciously, did she avenge Grant's infidelity (like her closeness with Aubrey)?
Let's talk about the adaptation of the novel to the film. The original novel is a third-person omniscient perspective, and the film is Grant's perspective (third-person limited perspective). At the beginning of the novel, it tells the story of Grant and Fiona from falling in love to marriage in a very short space, similar to a "prequel", and then jumps to the clue of Fiona's Alzheimer's disease more than 40 years later, and All kinds of hospitalization afterward. In the meantime, the timeline of the story twists and turns in their married life. The film begins with Grant driving to the "rival" home, then reviews some old events from Grant's perspective, and then returns to the main line, supplemented by interludes. In short, the freedom of time and space jumps, and the focus is on the psychological portrayal of the characters. The film has a good grasp of the essence of the original work at the level of "stream of consciousness".
Other than that, the film does not make much changes to the novel, and the plot basically follows the original. The original title of the novel is "The Bear Comes Over the Mountain", which originated from an English nursery rhyme "The Bear Went Over the Mountain" (The Bear Went Over the Mountain) in the 1940s. The song sings: "The bear goes to the other side of the mountain/As if it can see something.../That side of the mountain/That's all it can see..." Then, the bear who came back from "the other side of the mountain" has probably seen to everything it wants to see. Just like in the film, the hero and heroine finally determined their feelings and desires after getting old.
(Original WeChat public account: Daily Aesthetics)
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