The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie
Picture: C+
Sound: B- Extras: C+ Film: B
Maggie Smith is an amazing actress without any doubt,
still a working star decades later. The
Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie (1969) is a still impressive film with Smith offering
an enduring performance as the title character, a teacher who is subtly
overbearing when it comes to her students at an all-girls school. She has her conflicts with the head of the
school who hates her, a few men she is also at odds with and a style of
conformity that devours impressionable youth and goes as far as to support
Mussolini!
The year is 1932 and as smart, educated and intelligent as
Brodie is, her pompousness has made her enough a fit in for her to build an
undeniable stronghold in her Edinburgh school with all of its own high
standards. That sets the stage for all
of her issues and conflict to inevitably come to a head at the same time. What could have been another run-on
melodrama has some surprising edge; especially considering the conformist world
it takes place in, but something deeper triumphs about the dangers of blind
faith. That especially rang true during
the Vietnam era.
Pamela Franklin has the job of eventually going up against
Smith and remarkably pulls it off, one of the best child actors of her
generation and simply born with the talent.
Gordon Jackson, known later for his stint on the hit British TV series The
Professionals, takes a less serious turn and shows what else he is capable
of. Then there is Robert Stevens, who
was involved with Smith in real life at the time, as Teddy. He is an artist who has had a falling out
with Brodie and the situation just gets more and more frayed. Jay Presson Allen (Hitchcock’s Marnie)
adapted this original Muriel Spark novel as a play, and is responsible for the
screenplay here. It is an amazing work
that even director Ronald Neame stuck strictly to. This is a fine dramatic work that has somehow stood the test of
time in ways not expected and this DVD version makes it all the more so.
The anamorphically enhanced 1.85 X 1 image shows some age
in the way the color turns on and off slightly at the edges and with a few
other minor blemishes, but it looks good for its age. Without those minor flaws, it would easily rate higher, with color
consistency otherwise and some good depth.
Ted Moore, B.S.C., had been shooting many of the James Bond films and
missed On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (issued the same year) in part in
taking this on. It is more masterful
work from one of the greatest cameramen of all time. The Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo is better than the 2.0 English Mono,
even offering some slight Pro Logic surrounds, a mode this mix actually plays
better in. French and Spanish Mono are
also offered. Extras include the
theatrical teaser and trailer from the original release, trailers from several
other Fox DVD classic titles, a few stills in a gallery section, and an
exemplary audio commentary that vies between Franklin and director Neame. They are both terrific and it is one to catch.
Neame, who has given us important films like The
Horse’s Mouth (1958) with Alec Guinness, is honest enough to be
self-critical and notes that a few parts of the film drag on. He’s right, but is wise enough to
acknowledge it was him then and not now, instead of going back and destroying
the film for some “director’s cut”. He
truly is one of the great gentleman directors and that is all the more reason
to admire The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie, no matter what misgivings he or
this critic may have. The acting of the
cast, even the young ladies of the time, endures and Smith deserves her legend
al the more.
- Nicholas Sheffo
