“The Importance of Being Earnest,” a 2002 film by Oliver Parker, is one of many attempts to make Oscar Wilde’s eponymous play more accessible to the general public, who, due to a myriad of reasons, have not had the privilege to read the book. However, although the movie does copy faithfully the play’s most plots and make a few creative adaptions, it can hardly be called a responsible representation of Wilde’s original play, suggesting that people who have not read the play should not trust the movie as a suitable substitute for the play. Presumably, the movie’s goal is to render the play less serious, therefore more acceptable. However, this was overdone: the movie ends up appearing overly lighthearted and consequently loses the play’s essence.
As said, the movie makes indeed a few good changes based on the play. The team is motivated enough to research on material Wilde cut from the play prior to its publication, including a small episode in which the money collectors come to Jack’s country home in order to collect debt from Algernon, and insert these plots into the movie. The movie also does a good job visualizing Cecilia’s boundless fascinations, by inserting elements such as medieval armors, hot air balloons and fantasy beasts; these elements blend so well within the movie that one can hardly tell whether it is only within Cecilia’s mind. Also noticeable is the movie’s soundtrack. Having Jack and Algernon singing “Lady come down” definitely adds wit and humor to this comedy.
Unfortunately, though, the movie makes many fatal mistakes that the audience should not overlook. These include a non-sequitur that, because it horrendously alters the story’s rationale, heavily affects the audience’s understanding. In the play, out of secrecy, Jack and Algernon’s conversations regarding “Bunburying” take place in Algernon’s residence. However, for reasons unknown, in the movie same conversations happen in what appears to be a club, with the crowds around them constantly making sounds of surprise. Similarly, when Jack proposes to Gwendolyn, Lady Bracknell is sitting right behind an unclosed door — one can hardly expect that she knows nothing of the proposal, unless she is hopelessly deaf. Abandonment of these conversations’ secrecy hardly makes sense. Moreover, the movie makes, at any rate, irresponsible and unnecessary speculations on several main characters. It has Gwendolyn and Jack tattoo each other’s names, which makes them seem nothing more than idling hipsters; worse, in the movie, Lady Bracknell starts as a dancer in a vaudeville and only makes it to the Bracknell family after finding herself pregnant — one does not have to be extravagantly fond of Lady Bracknell to find these details jarring, not to mention far stretched. Apart from these hardly satisfactory adaptions, the movie’s casting too is a disaster. Admittedly, hardly any person apart Wilde himself really knows how to handle his witty remarks, so accusing the actors of their stiff facial expressions and their lifeless intonation may be overly harsh, although they are the very people who ruin the play’s jokes. However, among all actors, the chief problem is with Colin Firth. He makes such a righteous and majestic presence that one wonders whether the man he tries to portray is really George VI or Jack Worthing.
However, the movie’s most significant mistake, as well as the reason why I assert that Wilde would not enjoy the movie, resides in its ending. According to the movie, the name of Jack’s father is really John, making a point that Jack (or John) has always been lying about his name anyway, whereas in the movie, his birth name is indeed Ernest — the name he has for countless times proclaimed. Presumably, Wilde’s intention is to make Jack realize that, contrary to his intention to lie, he always sticks to the truth. Thus, the central irony emerges: In the play Cecilia says, in Wilde’s usual fashion of “inversion,” that “I hope you have not been leading a double life, pretending to be wicked and being really good all the time. That would be hypocrisy” — and now we know that Jack has been doing exactly the same. Unfortunately, in the movie the irony is lost. In fact, Wilde himself would find this ending hardly satisfactory. In the play, he has Algernon make a point that “one must be serious about something, if one wants to have any amusement in life. I happen to be serious about Bunburying.” In his own case, Wilde is in fact very persistent on the theme of double life, as can be seen from his various works such as The Picture of Dorian Gray; such persistence on a theme indeed calls for more than so careless a movie adaption, which dismissively excises the presence of Jack’s second identity.
One certainly hopes that a movie production is as worth seeing as the original script it is based on. This, however, is not the case of this movie. As said, Wilde’s persistence on the theme of double life suggests that he after all wants the play to be taken temperately, if not overly, serious. However, by rendering the theme unnecessarily insignificant, as well as making a few other errors of judgement, the movie is to be seen as an unsuccessful replication of the play.
Works Cited
Parker, Oliver, director. The Importance of Being Earnest. Miramax Films, 2002.
Wilde, Oscar. The Importance of Being Earnest and Other Plays. Penguin Books, 2000. Print.
