A Quiet Passion – Das Leben der Emily Dickinson (2016)

A Quiet Passion – Das Leben der Emily Dickinson: Directed by Terence Davies. With Emma Bell, Sara Vertongen, Rose Williams, Benjamin Wainwright. The story of American poet Emily Dickinson from her early days as a young schoolgirl to her later years as a reclusive, unrecognized artist.

“Written and directed by Terence Davies, this film brings out several key points in the life of the great American poet Emily Dickinson: her growing reclusiveness, the fact she dressed in white, the small number of poems she published (in fact she wrote some 1800), her admiration for the Brontës and the major illness she contracted. In one comic scene, she scolds the local newspaper editor for changing her punctuation. This also reflects a key point because her poems are, curiously, full of capitalised initial letters and dashes.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eSadly, though, I think the filmu0026#39;s dialogue lets it down. There are a number of epigrams which sound like a pastiche of Oscar Wilde, e.g. (quotations arenu0026#39;t all verbatim) u0026#39;Virtue is vice in disguiseu0026#39;, u0026#39;Admiration is another name for envyu0026#39;, u0026#39;Envy is another name for admirationu0026#39; and u0026#39;Contempt breeds familiarityu0026#39;. Such self-conscious quips are rather distracting, except, I would say, from Dickinsonu0026#39;s Aunt Elizabeth.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eDespite its title, the film isnu0026#39;t exactly quiet. The characters are very talkative and Dickinson seems to be confined to her room only by her illness. Her physical deterioration is, however, really terrifying; Iu0026#39;d even say itu0026#39;s the strongest part of the film. Another strength lies in the poems that are read in voice-over. Though there arenu0026#39;t many, they do include u0026#39;This World is Not Conclusionu0026#39;, which distils her profound sense of the mystery of existence. Expressing this in the film, she displays an unorthodox view of religion which scandalises her family.u003cbr/u003eu003cbr/u003eCynthia Nixon sustains the role of Dickinson quite impressively, but Jennifer Ehle seems to me to have more charm as her sister Lavinia (u0026#39;Vinnyu0026#39;). As Aunt Elizabeth, Annette Badland almost steals the show. Itu0026#39;s just a pity that sheu0026#39;s only on for a short time near the beginning.”