brideshead revisited

The manor that served as the setting for Brideshead Revisited's latest cinematographic incarnation is an absolutely sumptuous example of English baroque architecture, replete with the artistic hallmarks of aristocratic decadence at its luxurious best!

Although its real name is Castle Howard, the edifice is not technically a castle, since it was obviously not designed to serve a military function. The early-18th Century stately residence in North Yorkshire was built by the Third Earl of Carlisle and incredibly, still serves as a private residence for his decedents to this day. That such an ostentatious vestige of an era defined by insatiable opulence and institutionalized social inequity should still serve a private function in this day and age seems almost obscene. But to be fair to the current owners, they have allowed the building to be gazetted as a national heritage site and it is seasonally open to the public who are free to roam its expansive verdant vicinities and attend a number of concerts hosted on its grounds throughout the year.

The film, based on the eponymous novel by Evelyn Waugh (who was a dude, in case you're wondering) dilutes the theological didacticism found in the original work of its author and is more concerned with recounting the scandalous romances revolving around the protagonist, an young man of modest means who suddenly finds himself in the favour of the scion of a noble family dominated by a maniacally staunch Catholic matriarch. The noblelad, who is unambiguously gay, takes his unassuming handsome friend to his ancestral home - Brideshead - and into his confidence and overtime, the two become bosom buddies, seeing in each other a part of the social and ideological misfit that each had always believed himself to be.

Their unlikely friendship unravels when he is caught by his rich friend, who by now had obviously taken a more-than-platonic interest in him, trying to seduce his sister while the trio were on a holiday to visit their father and his mistress in Venice. Tensions mount as his erstwhile benefactor descends into alcoholism in an attempt to numb both his perceived betrayal and his mother's overbearing religious strictures. Meanwhile, his mother detects a budding-if-tense romance between his sister and his friend (who is an avowed atheist) and arranges for her to be wed to an obnoxious Canadian man, whose only virtue is apparently the religion that they shared.

Four years later, his former friend's desperate mother begs him to go to Morocco, where he had run away to, to persuade him to come home. He traces him down but discovers that his body is so ravaged by his years of drinking that he is in no condition to endure the arduous journey by ship back to England. The now-sober scion becomes an afterthought for the rest of the movie and we eventually learn that he joined a monastery where he is to spend the rest of his life.

Years pass and our protagonist is now a promising painter - the darling of high society on both sides of the Atlantic. Chance leads to an encounter aboard a ship between protagonist and love interest and they both consummate their latent love on board without regard for their own spouses from whom they are estranged. Although they agree to separate from their spouses in order to be together, the prospects of "living in sin" loom over her like a dark cloud as her Catholic neuroses inflicted upon her by her now-deceased mother come back to haunt her. As the illicit pair return to Brideshead to seek an annulment from her husband and bid a final farewell to her elder brother, they meet their dying father who had come home to spend his final days. Thoughts of eloping take flight in the face of her father's impending death. Upon his deathbed, she is overwhelmed by emotion as she sees her father makes the sign of the cross, a signal that he repented of his infidelity and was reconciled to god. In the same vein, she decides that she could not bring herself to offend god's mercy by living in sin, in spite of her love for our protagonist.

Years later, during the Second World War, he revisits Brideshead as a military officer. The manor has now been possessed by the military for use as an army base. Walking the familiar halls, he reminisces and finds himself in the chapel, where his friend had brought him to half a lifetime ago. He is tempted to extinguish the votive candle lit in front of the Virgin's statue, an act of resentment and retribution for the loss that religion had cost him, but hesitates and eventually decides not to. He turns around and leaves the chapel, walking into the chaos of the War, but not before remembering an internal battle that had claimed him long before.