Bonham Carter, who won several critics association honors for her performance (she was nominated for a Golden Globe and Oscar as well) stars as Kate, who is engaged in a secret affair with Merton (Linus Roache), a journalist whose poor financial standing makes marriage impossible. Kate's manipulative aunt (Charlotte Rampling) threatens to disown her unless she marries the more suitable Lord Mark (Alex Jennings). Opportunity--admittedly sordid--arrives in the form of Millie (Alison Elliott), an American heiress whom Kate befriends. When Kate learns that Millie is dying, she suggests to Merton that he seduce her to make her last days happy, and ensuring that Millie will leave Merton her money when she dies. Merton reluctantly agrees, just as Kate begins to have second thoughts that threaten to sabotage the scheme.

One of the most rapturously reviewed films in recent years, Wings of the Dove is a must-own film for the Merchant-Ivory crowd. But guys: don't dismiss this as a "chick flick." Beneath its Masterpiece Theatre exterior beats the wild and untamed heart of Dawson's Creek. --Donald Liebenson

Helena Bonham Carter as Kate Croy the English adventuress, Linus Roache as Merton Densher her impecunious journalist lover, and Allison Elliot as Millie Theale their intended victim, are the principal actors in this drama of psychological twists and turns.

In the opening scene Carter, swathed from head to foot in Victorian attire, exudes an aura of compelling eroticism as she trysts with her lover, Merton, in a crowded tram-car. In the film's closing scene, in bed with him stark naked her whole body reflects the despair of her plots gone wrong. In between this sensual opening and this depressing conclusion her gorgeous face is a telling kaleidoscope of emotions. Carter can register more with her eyes than most actors can with a whole script, and the camera under Ian Softley's direction lingers upon her face as Carter's convincing expressions underscore the nuances of the action.

As Kate's plot congeals and unravels with her own conflicting emotions Carter projects a welter of pragmatic and sympathetic motives. Trapped by her love for middleclass Merton, her devotion to her penniless father, and her ambition for wealth and position, Kate inveigles herself into a close relationship with Millie, the wealthy winsome American girl making her Grand Tour even as she is dying of cancer. Millie, warm-hearted and brave, falls in love with Merton at first sight without knowing that he is Kate's lover. Reluctantly, Merton allows himself to be used to satisfy the girl's need for love. In an utterly moving scene at the climax of the film, Millie reveals the depths of her own character when the realization of how she has been duped is forced upon her.

Millie dies and Merton is devastated by his own treachery. "If I had wings like a dove I would fly away and be at rest," are the words that fill him at her funeral. Director Softley touches deftly upon this moving scene and moves into the denouement. Now Kate has what she wanted, Merton and the fortune, which Millie has left to her. But Millie has left something else as well...the enfolding wings of the dove.

In Carter's hands Kate is never a really unsympathetic character, and in the end she is a truly tragic one.


Love cannot be calculated   November 1, 2005
 19 out of 22 found this review helpful

Three reasons that this film shines:

1. An excellent screenplay that captures the gist of the novel and without getting bogged down.

2. Alison Elliot and Linus Roache outperform Helena Bonham Carter, no small feat, to create a special love.

3. Venice, shot so as to seem completely in the period of the story, makes it clear why this city was (and is) special.


A fascinating "modernization" of the Henry James novel   December 11, 2004
 16 out of 17 found this review helpful

I have been seeing previews for "The Wings of the Dove" for years on various DVDs that I have rented and finally got around to watching this adaptation of the Henry James novel. When I finished watching it the thing that struck me was how the attempt to modernize the story worked both for and against what James had written. Now, what makes this a particularly perspective to take on the film is that the adaptation by Hossein Amini moves the time frame of the story up eight years to 1910. That might seem a minor change, one scarcely worthy of note, but in 1902 good old Queen Victoria had not been in her tomb a year and the age that bears her name was still on its last legs (more to the point, James had been working on the novel for years, so it was clearly written during the Victorian Age). When you change the setting to 1910 it is then the end of the Edwardian Age, which makes a big difference, especially from the standpoint of English morality.

Kate Croy (Helena Bonham-Carter) has taken as her lover Merton Densher (Linus Roache), who has neither the position nor the fortune to win her hand. Kate's father (Michael Gambon) is destitute, and they both depend on the good graces of her dour and demanding Aunt Maude (Charlotte Rampling), who forbids the union and has a rich man in mind for Kate who seems willing to marry for love but would like it even more if money was involved. When Kate seeks independence from her aunt she enters the circle of Millie Theale (Alison Elliott), an American girl who is known as "the richest orphan in the world" and who is seeing the world before she dies, and a plan is hatched. Merton will woo Millie, marry her before she dies, and inherit her fortune, at which point he can marry Kate and the life they envision will become reality. I think you see it coming from a mile away that Merton will fall for Millie before she dies, and that there is a price to be paid for such an undertaken.

James makes this story even more interesting because Millie harbors little if any illusions as to what Kate and Merton are up to. Kate tells Merton their plan will succeed because she knows how Millie loves, but she never realizes that the same is true for the American girl. Besides, Millie is touring Europe on her own agenda, which is to drink deeply from the cup of life before it is untimely ripped from her lips. For her, Merton's attentions are something else to be experienced. Perhaps she knows that he will play the part so well that at some point he will stop acting, and perhaps it does not matter to her because when she is dead in grave the difference will not matter a whit.

The shift in period matters because the master plan here runs more against the grain of Victorian morality than it does compared to the looser standards that followed. Within another decade the English would be fighting a war involving machine guns, poisoned gas, bombs dropped from airplanes, and a new array of modern horrors. Move the story forward another eight years and we would expect Kate's character to be urging Merton to murder Millie, which would actually make her more like the Kate in the novel than what we find in this 1997 film.

In the end, the fact that Kate and Millie like each other and that Millie implicitly acknowledges and accepts the deal that is represented by Merton, makes a big difference. The question is not whether the plan will work, but what will Merton and Kate be like when it is over and what will have happened to both their relationship and the plans that they have made. Millie is in love with life, and some of that rubs off on Merton, so that he is not the man Kate sent off into the arms of another women. In his attempt to get what he wants, he comes even closer to something he can never have and in the final scene all that Kate can offer to him seems rather hollow.

The performances in "The Wings of the Dove" are, for the most part, beautifully understated. Bonham-Carter was nominated for a Best Actress Oscar, as was Amini's adapted screenplay, Eduardo Serra's cinematography, and Sandy Powell's costume design. Ultimately, I think Amini's decision to move the story forward from the end of one age to another, is on the mark and the changes that required in James' novel work if for no other reason than having Kate know how much she is risking in sending Merton to Millie's side from the very start makes the human drama much richer.


"What Could the Rain Do to Me?"   June 26, 2005
 16 out of 18 found this review helpful

Rarely has a film of such extraordinary visual beauty reached the profound emotional depths of this magnificently acted period film from Iain Softley. Based on the novel by Henry James, cinematographer Eduardo Serra sets a table of beauty and elegance while screenwriter Houssein Amini serves up dishes of love, passion and desire, all arranged in their proper order by director Softley, creating an unforgettable dining experience.

Helena Bonham Carter is Kate, a passionate beauty in love with Martin (Linus Roache), a man without money. Charlotte Rampling is her rich aunt, who may force her to marry well, but not for love. Kate has a fire burning beneath her dark beauty, however, and when fate gives her an opportunity to show Martin how she loves, a dangerous journey down winding currents is begun, and neither she nor Martin will be prepared for what awaits them at the river's end.

Alison Elliot is simply marvelous as Millie, her finest role since "The Spitfire Grill." Millie is a charming American girl of great wealth reaching out to touch life before it passes by. She and Kate will become fast and inseparable friends, but Millie's attraction to Martin and a secret discovered by Kate will set in tenuous motion a plan to solve all their problems. When the maneuvering of lives like chess pieces involves both the human heart and someone as special as Millie, however, unforseen complications can arise.

Helena Bonham Carter may have received all the nominations as the beautiful and passionate Kate, but Alison Elliot's portrayel of the sweet and open Millie, rich but lonely, and desparate for love, deserved an Oscar and Golden Globe nomination as well. Italy is beautifully recreated from the period in a film of both depth and beauty.

This film is a true cinematic masterpiece. A gratuitous scene with Carter near the end of this film seems out of place, but can not detract from its beauty. Fine Italian lace is gently lifted back to reveal an emotionally naked look at the human heart. It is substance with beauty and beauty with substance, and is not to be missed.