My Millais research late last week led to me to this newish film about the artists wife, Effie Gray, who was once married to critic John Ruskin (unhappily) and had the marriage annuled (complete with a court-appointed exam to prove she had never been de-virginated.) On Netflix, that and a recent delve into period film, led me to a great little re-imagining of Ophelia, one in which she is not grief stricken and mad, but capable and still with her wits about her to escape one of the saddest fates in Shakespeare. Hamlet is not my favorite Shakespeare, but I really liked this one, which also gave more dimension to Gertrude as more than just an adulterous monster who helps murder her husband. To not give too much away, they lift the falsely dead potion from Romeo and Juliet and use it to Ophelia's advantage. Most people still die, it is Hamlet after all, but Ophelia manages to survive. (In fact , I was hoping she would ditch Hamlet and run off with Horatio, who was a far better match.)
I also caught a couple of Arthurian adaptations this week after all that sorting of of Guinevere last week, and she is far more complicated. I know it exists, but I've yet to find, on film, a story more geared from her p-o-v. First Knight, from the 90's was close, but still very male-oriented. I just need to keep digging. When I first started writing poems, somewhere there is a poem about Guinevere in The Archaeologists Daughter, my first chap, where many of these women were given a small snippet of voice. I know I have also written about Ophelia, at least a couple times, but don't think they made it into any books. (including one somewhere that deals with Gregory Crewdson's photo version of her. )
A friend and I talk often about the kind of stories that get told in Hollywood, the hero and anti-hero narratives that dominate the theatrical releases, where the money is. How they miss so much. How streaming services and cable networks are better at giving voice to a larger slice of experience. We're mostly talking about horror, but it could be said more generally. In the lit world, there have been many female-character focused retellings of old, worn out stories, and I would love to see these and more on film.
