Customer Reviews

The Member of the Wedding [VHS]

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The Columbia 1952 movie based on McCullers' play and novel and starring two of the greatest actresses N.America has produced and a child actor of genius, is one of the greatest and most surprising films to come from a major Hollywood studio and by producing it Stanley Kramer went some way towards atoning for all those stinkers he later directed.Zinneman said it was his favorite of all his movies.Had Fielder Cook seen this particular masterpiece when he had the nerve to expose an unsuspecting tv audience to THIS abortion? If so he should be ashamed of himself. I thought it would be interesting to see Alfre Woodard's take on Berenice Sadie Brown surely SHE (a fine actor when given the opportunity) had seen Ethel Water's brilliant performance- but she stood no chance against the willfully bad adaptation of this version.(That ending!!!) I place no blame on Antipodean actress Anna Paquin for not coming within a million miles of Julie Harris'
astonishing performance- even though she is nearer Frankie's age of 12-for her, growing up in the the deep South of the 40s would have been an unknowable experience. To sum up: if you have seen the 1952 movie and/or love the novel, steer well clear of this disaster. I think the Zinneman masterpiece is coming soon on dvd- wait for that!

Anyone familiar with the play or the 1952 version with Julie
Harris will wonder what happened in this remake. The producers
went back to McCullers' novel and adapted that version. When
McCuller's adapted the work for the stage she made several
changes. Alfre Woodard is wonderful as Berniece and Anna
Paquin captures the hormones-ragin teenager quite well. The
matted colors make you feel you are part of the environment.
I am glad there are two versions of the story on video and both
are worth having.

The Carson McCullers' novel whom this movie is based on is very simple on its surface, but deeply it contains a stunning sadness and melancholy that the intelligent writer expresses perfectly.

It has characters whose lifes are normal without nothing special happening to them, but the deep feelings are there and the novel captures them in a very special way. There lies the greatness of the book.

But, ¿Is possible to translate this to the screen? Well, is not an easy job, but here we have an excellent and very faithful adaptation of the story of Frankie Addams with the same minimalism that characterizes the novel (sometimes it seems a play rather than a movie) and, of course, its same power. Is the story of Frankie (a wonderful Paquin), a tall, depressive, imaginative and sad 12 years-old girl who hopes to runaway from her village with her brother and his girlfriend (who are going to marry that summer). Meanwhile she spends that long and hot summer with the only company of Berenice (Woodard) and her cousin John Henry (Dunn).

The movie's great success is on the casting: this is the movie of Anna Paquin, who is so believable and superb as Frankie that ends becoming Frankie rather than playing her. To see Paquin dreaming of Alaska, hitting a soldier or not hearing what others say in her conversations is to see the Frankie of the novel; and to see Paquin suffering in the long scene of Woodard's monologue and in the ending is to suffer like when you're reading the book. There Frankie and her mind are the center of the story and in the movie the center becomes Paquin, with the same rage of Flora from "The Piano" and the same sadness and melancholy of Amy from "Fly Away Home".

Summarizing, an excellent TV-movie for those who admire the novel and Carson McCullers and for those who admire Anna Paquin, one of the most talented young actresses actually.

The book was made into a GREAT movie in 1952. For some odd reason, they tried to re-do it in 1998 and the result is AWFUL.
The casting is all wrong, the script is totally re-done until it does not even resemble the original. The ending just fizzles out and has no point. Imagine going to see West Side Story, but there is no music, and everyone lives at the end. You would wonder what idiot was trying to pass off that farce as being the genuine West Side Story.
It is exactly the same situation here, if you buy this version you will NOT be seeing the REAL story, and you won't even be seeing very good acting. It is an absolute waste of time, period !!!