a little bit of David Tennant: ‘Bright Young Things’
Oh man, do I love this movie. It’s so good, and so chock full of a slew of bright young British actors -- Michael Sheen, Emily Mortimer, Stephen Campbell Moore, Fenella Woolgar, James McAvoy -- that I always forget that David Tennant is in it until he suddenly shows up and starts behaving in a generally disagreeable way. If his character in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire is actively evil, then here he’s merely icky and repulsive... but seeing as this is a dramedy of social mores and manners, that makes him very much the villain indeed. I like that about Tennant, that he takes on unpleasant characters with such relish, like Ginger Littlejohn here, and doesn’t always feel the need to make them likeable.
It’s easy to see how that could have been the impulse, to make Ginger more likeable, with 2003’s Bright Young Things, because Stephen Fry -- making his directorial debut, adapting the Evelyn Waugh novel, Vile Bodies -- has such sympathy for all his characters, a gaggle of bored aristocrats in 1930s London. They’re almost all hopelessly shallow, but Fry’s approach to them is not: they may not entirely deserve his sympathy, but they get it nonetheless. Fry recognizes that their confusion and general messed-up-ed-ness is as much as product of their time as it is their own fault, and anyway, the upcoming War will be a right smack in the face to them all.
But in this deep -- and funny! -- movie about shallow people and the culture that created them, Tennant’s Ginger is unrelentingly horrid, if in a mild, upper-class-twit kind of way. He’s the kind of man who sees women as a commodity, prizes to be won from other men, though he pretends that overt discussion of women as prizes revolts him. He’s the kind of imbecile who says things like: “I mean, look here. Dammit. Do you see what I mean?” -- his conversation is completely content-free. He sports what one character calls a “vulgar mustache” that makes him look “like a debt collector”... and even when he reveals the vain reason he wears a mustache, we want to laugh at him, even though it’s no more and no less pathetic and petty and indicative of normal human weakness than the foibles of every other character here. It’s as if Tennant goes out of his way here to ensure that we see Ginger as a weasel.
Look: Poor Emily Mortimer can’t bear to be kissed by him
he’s that gross.
If one quick hit could describe Bright Young Things, I’d call it “poignant satire.” Except there’s nothing poignant about Tennant’s Ginger. He’s the character we love to hate here.
Geek alert: Here’s Tennant with Mark Gatiss, who’d show up later in one of Tennant’s Doctor Who episodes:
Not suitable for:
• anyone with a phobia of vulgar facial hair
David Tennant checklist:
• Scottish accent: no
• big hair: no
• ginger hair: yes
• nudity: no
• sex: no
• do you want to have sex with him: no
• alcohol/drugs/smoking: yes
• snazzy automobile that all the chicks dig: yes
[part of my “summer of David Tennant and ‘Hamlet’” series]
(Technorati tags: Bright Young Things, David Tennant)
comments
posted by Laurie Mann (Sun Aug 17 08, 5:00PM)
I saw Bright Young Things earlier this year, and it struck me that, casting-wise, it's an awful lot like American Graffiti. There are a huge number of British actors who were pretty much unknown at the time, but have since gone on to varying degrees of fame and fortune.
Speaking of Dr. Who geekiness, you know about 1996's Jude, don't you?
Ooops, just did a search and found you discussed it when I was at Worldcon.
Yeah, the movie is depressing, but Eccleston and Winslet are both pretty amazing.
posted by Paula (Sun Aug 17 08, 6:32PM)
Oh, my gosh, I watched this over and over and only stopped because it was time to return it to Netflix and get on with my life. Ginger was laughable. He was so unlikeable, so unspeakably vapidly English that I couldn't get enough of him. And the "dammit" scene had me in stitches. Watched it over and over and then had to call my husband in to watch it. You just know he didn't have to be coached to play it that way; he is so overwhelmingly talented. Kudos to Stephen Fry who seems to be magical in every production I've seen him act in. ...still laughing over Jeeves and Wooster ("tee dee hee dee hee dee hee, Sir.") I just love Tennant with all my heart, no matter what he's in (with the exception of Secret Smile. My crush could not extend that far.)
posted by Joanne (Mon Aug 18 08, 1:45AM)
I had completely forgotten Tennant was in this! Mind you, having looked at the pictures, it's probably not surprising ...
Of course the other DW reference is that Fenella Woolgar got the job as Agatha Christie because DT recommended her, having worked with her in this. Good recommendation too, she was excellent (in both this film, and "The Unicorn and the Wasp").
posted by Paul Hayesl (Mon Aug 18 08, 6:02PM)
Stephen Fry does a story about how one of the crewmembers on the film was overheard to ask why Tennant kept putting on a Scottish accent between takes.
posted by Weimlady (Mon Aug 18 08, 6:51PM)
Fenella Woolgar's character ended up marrying David's character in He Knew He Was Right, so they have additional history of working together. (Oops, do I need to worry about spoilers for Trollope? If so, sorry!)
posted by Dawn (Tue Aug 19 08, 5:46PM)
For all I love Stephen Fry, James McAvoy et al I just could not get into this film at all when it came out - and even when it was on TV again over here in the UK recently... I tried, really I did, but it just wasn't for me. And no - it doesn't have anything to do with DT playing a slimeball (with a moustache) - I just find it hard work. It's OK but that's about it for me. Funny thing was they had a DT short on afterwards which I caught by accident (with Ray Winstone - set in a multistory car park - title escapes me for the moment!) which lightened my mood:) I'd watch Secret Smile over it anyday (and have, twice, very recently!!!)
posted by Paul Hayesl (Wed Aug 20 08, 7:33AM)
I couldn't be doing with "Secret Smile". I thought it was one of the most ridiculous things I had ever seen.
posted by Dawn (Wed Aug 20 08, 7:56AM)
I didn't say I loved "Secret Smile" - just saying that I preferred it in comparison to the film! My personal opinion that's all...
The BBC here seems to be planning a David Tennant Lovefest. Starting Saturday they are showing "Takin' Over The Asylum" eps 1 and 2 and then Tuesday "The Chatterley Affair" - all on BBC4. No doubt warming us up for "Einstein and Eddison" coming soon. I'm not complaining - obviously...
posted by Weimlady (Mon Aug 25 08, 5:49AM)
Spoiler warning
Watched this today, thanks to FlickFilosopher and my local library. And I have to say I didn't find Ginger repulsive at all until his last scene. Even then repulsive is too strong a word. Sad. Disappointing. But not repulsive, because what he did was so human, and he clearly managed to convince himself that he was doing no wrong in supplying a few luxuries to people in war time. And of course, he had good reason to be bitterly disillusioned. Nina had married him pregnant with his rival's child and had passed the boy off as Ginger's. Do you really think he was so clueless as to buy that, especially when she made Adam the child's godfather in absentia? No, he did the stiff-upper-lip honorable thing and pretended, pretended he had a loyal wife and that the boy was his and that he had a good thing going. Facing arrest and public disgrace, though, he got honest with himself and sold out. :-> OK, not exactly admirable, but I still say, understandable, forgiveable, and not repulsive. And he's right--he would do very well in America, and probably did.
Maybe I find him more sympathetic than MaryAnn does because I can't find David Tennant unsympathetic in anything he does (N.B.--haven't seen Secret Smile yet!). Or maybe it's just that I'm such an Anglophile and Ginger is, well, so veddy British. Yes, he sees women as prizes to be won from other men, but that's just the attitude of the time, and after all, it was Adam who first suggested that his interest in Nina could be purchased! Ginger quite rightly accused him of not being a gentleman for it, which of course was the harshest insult one British gentleman could give another in that era and culture.
In the commentary, Stephen Fry says that David Tennant will be a household name in a few years--yeppers, got that one right. And he also praised David's performance and particularly his accent, saying that 5% more either way and it wouldn't have worked, but that David nailed the self-righteous Colonial Brit marvelously.
I don't usually bother with commentaries, since many of them turn out to be a couple of people having an only-slightly pertinent conversation over top of a movie--a situation which drives me mad in the theatre, so why subject myself to it on a DVD?--but in this case, it was more like having a very knowledgeable friend at your elbow giving you a history lesson that illuminated what you were watching, as well as insight into the process of making a movie. My intent was just to listen to the commentary over David's scenes to see what Fry had to say about him, but I got hooked and kept listening.