Because of the way these three movies were shown on television yesterday, I saw 1918 first, then On Valentine's Day, then Courtship. This is the reverse order of the chronology portrayed, but it was extremely helpful in other ways. It made me think about how the author made the story unfold. This is also the order of the film releases, I believe.
Early in the watching, I realized that I was looking at a filmed version of a stage play. Once you get okay with this, you will be a better audience member. Yes, it's stilted. Yes, the dialogue requires things to be said again and again and the script allows soliloquies. Same thing with Shakespeare films, if you think about it, not that this is Shakespeare.
So, about "Courtship,".....
This is a carefully wrought period piece written by a modern author. It assumes that as you watch, you will slot in your own perspective as to how much has changed since these characters walked the world. There are two major themes here--the options available to a young man making his way in the world and the options available to a young woman making her way in the world. There are other themes as well--if you have family connections, should you draw on them and if so, to what extent? If you have no family connections, what should you do? If an important relative dies how does this affect your life? The social rules of nicety come up against the nature of gossip and a small town's rules as to who is allowed to gossip. The main character Elizabeth is quietly wise but still stuck with partial information gleaned here and there. How do women control the possibility of pregnancy? How did so and so behave as a young person? What backstories and lost loves explain the most conspicuous townspeople? The film lays seeds for another theme: eccentricity is a rough road and mental health becomes significant in the list of themes as the parallel stories develop, a girl gone wrong and an odd man who made poor choices.
Having grown up in a household with a martinet, angry father and a mother who quietly made peace behind his back but always defended him as being a good man, I am fully understanding of Elizabeth's father and in some ways of her mother also. Because I saw the three movies as a nonstop but wrong-order film festival and pieced together the story of how the father slowly reconciled to his daughter's romance and marriage, I understood this as I watched. Today, the day after, I need to talk to someone about it--you. The incredible tension that bears on this young woman as she moves between her own needs and the imposed rules of the family household in which she lives are the kinds of tensions I knew as a young woman. "Slipping around" without the parents' knowledge and deciding when to lie to them is the story of my own teens and young adulthood. Sure, it seems artificial to young people today probably, but that's the point. This is the story of how women lived at that time and surprisingly little had changed by the late 1950s and early 60s.
Elizabeth grew up always knowing of an early-widowed aunt and a maiden aunt ("Old Maid") as the alternative to romance and this dichotomy is embedded in this piece because the aunts are conveniently visiting, a Greek chorus who add sniping comments as the plot unfolds. The father Mr Vaughan asks point blank: Why can't my daughters be content to live at home with their mother and me--I am wealthy and I can take care of them. When asked "Is your own marriage a good thing and did it give you children and happiness" he says Yes but he unwittingly makes himself a two-face when he tells his daughters to stay single. Then the unmarried aunt defends herself--she chose the right alternative.
The trap for women--being a loose ("fast") woman vs being chaste and allowing the family to guide the choice of spouse (or no spouse) --polarizes the choices. There is no middle ground. An unchaste local girl and an ill-advised earlier romance by Elizabeth are the object lessons that continually get thrown in Elizabeth's face by her parents. Her mother uses love for control, her father uses hateful words.
The father's own failing--he is raising a deceitful son, off stage in this work--is another counterpoint. Elizabeth is such a good woman, yet the tolerance and forgiveness and second chances given the son are denied her. Her parents don't even consult her when they volunteer her to be a funeral pianist.
Elizabeth's love interest Horace is also under stress. HIs father died when he was young and his mother is absent, so he lacks home family connections. He has become a traveling man (sales rep) and has seen a wider world, but this town is his center. Yes, Elizabeth and her sister have been to a small college and have seen a bit, but they are still cloistered within the home. Horace owns a tuxedo and as do other young men. He wears it to the local private dances (listen for the Scott Joplin tunes and watch those dancers!) which of course tarnishes him in the eyes of Elizabeth's father. "Why doesn't your father like me?" is his urgent cry. What can he do to change this? Nothing, because "his people" are the wrong sort and traveling men have bad reputations. No matter what he does his absent family counts against him, even if he is related to many upstanding people in the town. His sorta-worldliness is an evil that Mr .Vaughan won't let inside the house if he can help it.
Yet, Mr. Vaughan and Horace have much in common--both of them lost their fathers at the same age. Mr. Vaughan, instead of sympathizing, blusters about his ability to rise above the circumstance. The next two films will continue to explore this awful tension between the two men.
This film takes place earlier in the war. The war is just a slight drum in the background. By the last of the three films, this drum will be banging more loudly in the themes--the disturbance of the Old South as the world intrudes. And we all know what else happened in 1918, which is a stern warning to my current world, as the Covid-19 stats in my state continue to rise. Death is always around the corner, not only a century ago but today as well.
Music, clothing, sets are interesting and I believe very accurate. Much is static, yet they give us a good view of the times. The black household servant sings offstage, songs of the day are hummed and sung casually, and Elizabeth and her sister play classical music, even as the ragtime floats in through the windows. Transportation is by buggies and by foot. A few camera shots show a tad of the town and environs, sufficient to give a feeling for the place.
Hallie Foote playing Elizabeth is frustratingly placid and yielding, yet there is so much unsaid beneath the surface of her character. "Yes, ma'am" and "Yes, sir" come from her lips so predictably, as if she is still 10 years old. Yet this character can also so gracefully say "I don't know," which is so refreshing after we've heard from someone who thinks he/she knows everything. She weathers the blows of life so well, and she grows. Even in this film, we find she is growing in confidence and assertiveness. All she needs is circumstances that force her to reveal herself. As I think over all the movies, it is she who I cannot forget.
Early in the watching, I realized that I was looking at a filmed version of a stage play. Once you get okay with this, you will be a better audience member. Yes, it's stilted. Yes, the dialogue requires things to be said again and again and the script allows soliloquies. Same thing with Shakespeare films, if you think about it, not that this is Shakespeare.
So, about "Courtship,".....
This is a carefully wrought period piece written by a modern author. It assumes that as you watch, you will slot in your own perspective as to how much has changed since these characters walked the world. There are two major themes here--the options available to a young man making his way in the world and the options available to a young woman making her way in the world. There are other themes as well--if you have family connections, should you draw on them and if so, to what extent? If you have no family connections, what should you do? If an important relative dies how does this affect your life? The social rules of nicety come up against the nature of gossip and a small town's rules as to who is allowed to gossip. The main character Elizabeth is quietly wise but still stuck with partial information gleaned here and there. How do women control the possibility of pregnancy? How did so and so behave as a young person? What backstories and lost loves explain the most conspicuous townspeople? The film lays seeds for another theme: eccentricity is a rough road and mental health becomes significant in the list of themes as the parallel stories develop, a girl gone wrong and an odd man who made poor choices.
Having grown up in a household with a martinet, angry father and a mother who quietly made peace behind his back but always defended him as being a good man, I am fully understanding of Elizabeth's father and in some ways of her mother also. Because I saw the three movies as a nonstop but wrong-order film festival and pieced together the story of how the father slowly reconciled to his daughter's romance and marriage, I understood this as I watched. Today, the day after, I need to talk to someone about it--you. The incredible tension that bears on this young woman as she moves between her own needs and the imposed rules of the family household in which she lives are the kinds of tensions I knew as a young woman. "Slipping around" without the parents' knowledge and deciding when to lie to them is the story of my own teens and young adulthood. Sure, it seems artificial to young people today probably, but that's the point. This is the story of how women lived at that time and surprisingly little had changed by the late 1950s and early 60s.
Elizabeth grew up always knowing of an early-widowed aunt and a maiden aunt ("Old Maid") as the alternative to romance and this dichotomy is embedded in this piece because the aunts are conveniently visiting, a Greek chorus who add sniping comments as the plot unfolds. The father Mr Vaughan asks point blank: Why can't my daughters be content to live at home with their mother and me--I am wealthy and I can take care of them. When asked "Is your own marriage a good thing and did it give you children and happiness" he says Yes but he unwittingly makes himself a two-face when he tells his daughters to stay single. Then the unmarried aunt defends herself--she chose the right alternative.
The trap for women--being a loose ("fast") woman vs being chaste and allowing the family to guide the choice of spouse (or no spouse) --polarizes the choices. There is no middle ground. An unchaste local girl and an ill-advised earlier romance by Elizabeth are the object lessons that continually get thrown in Elizabeth's face by her parents. Her mother uses love for control, her father uses hateful words.
The father's own failing--he is raising a deceitful son, off stage in this work--is another counterpoint. Elizabeth is such a good woman, yet the tolerance and forgiveness and second chances given the son are denied her. Her parents don't even consult her when they volunteer her to be a funeral pianist.
Elizabeth's love interest Horace is also under stress. HIs father died when he was young and his mother is absent, so he lacks home family connections. He has become a traveling man (sales rep) and has seen a wider world, but this town is his center. Yes, Elizabeth and her sister have been to a small college and have seen a bit, but they are still cloistered within the home. Horace owns a tuxedo and as do other young men. He wears it to the local private dances (listen for the Scott Joplin tunes and watch those dancers!) which of course tarnishes him in the eyes of Elizabeth's father. "Why doesn't your father like me?" is his urgent cry. What can he do to change this? Nothing, because "his people" are the wrong sort and traveling men have bad reputations. No matter what he does his absent family counts against him, even if he is related to many upstanding people in the town. His sorta-worldliness is an evil that Mr .Vaughan won't let inside the house if he can help it.
Yet, Mr. Vaughan and Horace have much in common--both of them lost their fathers at the same age. Mr. Vaughan, instead of sympathizing, blusters about his ability to rise above the circumstance. The next two films will continue to explore this awful tension between the two men.
This film takes place earlier in the war. The war is just a slight drum in the background. By the last of the three films, this drum will be banging more loudly in the themes--the disturbance of the Old South as the world intrudes. And we all know what else happened in 1918, which is a stern warning to my current world, as the Covid-19 stats in my state continue to rise. Death is always around the corner, not only a century ago but today as well.
Music, clothing, sets are interesting and I believe very accurate. Much is static, yet they give us a good view of the times. The black household servant sings offstage, songs of the day are hummed and sung casually, and Elizabeth and her sister play classical music, even as the ragtime floats in through the windows. Transportation is by buggies and by foot. A few camera shots show a tad of the town and environs, sufficient to give a feeling for the place.
Hallie Foote playing Elizabeth is frustratingly placid and yielding, yet there is so much unsaid beneath the surface of her character. "Yes, ma'am" and "Yes, sir" come from her lips so predictably, as if she is still 10 years old. Yet this character can also so gracefully say "I don't know," which is so refreshing after we've heard from someone who thinks he/she knows everything. She weathers the blows of life so well, and she grows. Even in this film, we find she is growing in confidence and assertiveness. All she needs is circumstances that force her to reveal herself. As I think over all the movies, it is she who I cannot forget.