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Beyond the Epic: The Life and Films of David Lean
Two-time Academy Award winner Sir David Lean (1908–1991) was one of the most prominent directors of the twentieth century, responsible for the classics The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), Lawrence of Arabia (1962), and Doctor Zhivago (1965). British-born Lean asserted himself in Hollywood as a major filmmaker with his epic storytelling and panoramic visions of history, but he started out as a talented film editor and director in Great Britain. As a result, he brought an art-house mentality to blockbuster films. Combining elements of biography and film criticism, Beyond the The Life and Films of David Lean uses screenplays and production histories to assess Lean's body of work. Author Gene D. Phillips interviews actors who worked with Lean and directors who knew him, and their comments reveal new details about the director's life and career. Phillips also explores Lean's lesser-studied films, such as The Passionate Friends (1949), Hobson's Choice (1954), and Summertime (1955). The result is an in-depth examination of the director in cultural, historical, and cinematic contexts. Lean's approach to filmmaking was far different than that of many of his contemporaries. He chose his films carefully and, as a result, directed only sixteen films in a period of more than forty years. Those films, however, have become some of the landmarks of motion-picture history. Lean is best known for his epics, but Phillips also focuses on Lean's successful adaptations of famous works of literature, including retellings of plays such as Brief Encounter (1945) and novels such as Great Expectations (1946), Oliver Twist (1948), and A Passage to India (1984). From expansive studies of war and strife to some of literature's greatest high comedies and domestic dramas, Lean imbued all of his films with his unique creative vision. Few directors can match Lean's ability to combine narrative sweep and psychological detail, and Phillips goes beyond Lean's epics to reveal this unifying characteristic in the director's body of work. Beyond the Epic is a vital assessment of a great director's artistic process and his place in the film industry.
592 pages, Hardcover
First published November 1, 2006
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
September 27, 2012
David Lean began his career carrying tea to filmmakers and doing other menial tasks. He then graduated to film cutter, demonstrating he had a good eye and helping out directors who could not master the Moviola, a contraption that synchronized picture and sound. And before long Lean had become a superb editor. In principle, this should have qualified him to be a commanding director: Visuals, not the words, are what predominate in cinema. Get the montage right — as he did in "Pygmalion" (1938) — and you have a rush of nearly wordless scenes that reveal all you need to know about Eliza Doolittle and her professor. This technique of cutting to decisive moments nearly equals that epitome of editing, the sequence of scenes that shows the deterioration of Charles Foster Kane's marriage in Orson Welles's masterpiece.
But Gene Phillips does not share Lean's editorial gifts. In "Beyond the Epic: The Life & Films of David Lean" (University of Kentucky Press, 535 pages, $39.95), he spares a paragraph or two for how Lean put "Pygmalion" together, and then he rattles on for page after page explaining how George Bernard Shaw, Gabriel Pascal (the rapscallion producer), and the rest of the universe reacted to the film.
Because Lean is awarded genius status, everything connected to him has to appear on Mr. Phillips's screen. Lean had six wives and behaved sort of like Henry VIII, so that the wives often appear somewhere in this celluloid life as outtakes, so to speak — ancillary to the true drama of the director's career.
Lean did his best work as a director early on when he had scripts like "Great Expectations" (1946) and "Oliver Twist" (1948) to discipline his infatuation with the panoramic screen. Did he see himself in service of a genius like Dickens and then later regard himself as belonging in the same category? When that happens, the director becomes a law unto himself.
I wasn't surprised to learn that Lean greeted the advent of sound with dismay. As the astringent David Thomson observes: "Lean became lost in the sense of his own pictorial grandeur." Alec Guinness, who had his share of battles with the lordly Lean, was surely right: It was a mercy that Lean did not live long enough to do his film of Conrad's "Nostromo."
After recently viewing Lean's putative masterpiece, "Lawrence of Arabia," I could not fathom the point of the film other than to produce stunning visuals and provide footage for the God-like Peter O'Toole. In search of relief from the turgid Mr. Phillips, I took another peek at the Lean entry in Mr. Thomson's inimitable "Biographical Dictionary of Film": "It is hard to discern what ‘Lawrence' is about — it seems afflicted with very English intimations that the desert is a place for miracles."
I'm not sure why Mr. Phillips decided to do this biography. To be sure, certain critics faulted his predecessor, Kevin Brownlow, for not including more film criticism in his biography of Lean. And Mr. Phillips, professor of film history and modern literature at Loyola University, does right by this aspect of Lean's achievement.
But Mr. Brownlow had extraordinary access to Lean and is certainly the better writer. At crucial points, Mr. Phillips has to rely on Mr. Brownlow, who is generously acknowledged in "Beyond the Epic" as Lean's "definitive biographer."
Mr. Phillips's elephantine effort is certainly worth close attention for film scholars — many of whom, including Mr. Brownlow, have praised his book. What they seem to be applauding, however, is primarily the scholar's energy and comprehensiveness. Of course, they also grant Lean his genius, which I am loath to do.
At his best, in the magnificent "Oliver Twist," dominated by the incomparable Alec Guinness, Lean had the sense to meld his superb editing with a world-class performance of one of literature's great characters.
"Oliver Twist" has pace and wit — the very qualities that later grandiose pictures like "Dr. Zhivago" lack. It ought to be the purpose of biography to explain what happened to Lean. Or as David Thomson concludes, "I challenge anyone to see ‘Oliver Twist' and ‘Dr. Zhivago' and not admit the loss. It will take a very good biography to explain that process." Well, I am still waiting.
But Gene Phillips does not share Lean's editorial gifts. In "Beyond the Epic: The Life & Films of David Lean" (University of Kentucky Press, 535 pages, $39.95), he spares a paragraph or two for how Lean put "Pygmalion" together, and then he rattles on for page after page explaining how George Bernard Shaw, Gabriel Pascal (the rapscallion producer), and the rest of the universe reacted to the film.
Because Lean is awarded genius status, everything connected to him has to appear on Mr. Phillips's screen. Lean had six wives and behaved sort of like Henry VIII, so that the wives often appear somewhere in this celluloid life as outtakes, so to speak — ancillary to the true drama of the director's career.
Lean did his best work as a director early on when he had scripts like "Great Expectations" (1946) and "Oliver Twist" (1948) to discipline his infatuation with the panoramic screen. Did he see himself in service of a genius like Dickens and then later regard himself as belonging in the same category? When that happens, the director becomes a law unto himself.
I wasn't surprised to learn that Lean greeted the advent of sound with dismay. As the astringent David Thomson observes: "Lean became lost in the sense of his own pictorial grandeur." Alec Guinness, who had his share of battles with the lordly Lean, was surely right: It was a mercy that Lean did not live long enough to do his film of Conrad's "Nostromo."
After recently viewing Lean's putative masterpiece, "Lawrence of Arabia," I could not fathom the point of the film other than to produce stunning visuals and provide footage for the God-like Peter O'Toole. In search of relief from the turgid Mr. Phillips, I took another peek at the Lean entry in Mr. Thomson's inimitable "Biographical Dictionary of Film": "It is hard to discern what ‘Lawrence' is about — it seems afflicted with very English intimations that the desert is a place for miracles."
I'm not sure why Mr. Phillips decided to do this biography. To be sure, certain critics faulted his predecessor, Kevin Brownlow, for not including more film criticism in his biography of Lean. And Mr. Phillips, professor of film history and modern literature at Loyola University, does right by this aspect of Lean's achievement.
But Mr. Brownlow had extraordinary access to Lean and is certainly the better writer. At crucial points, Mr. Phillips has to rely on Mr. Brownlow, who is generously acknowledged in "Beyond the Epic" as Lean's "definitive biographer."
Mr. Phillips's elephantine effort is certainly worth close attention for film scholars — many of whom, including Mr. Brownlow, have praised his book. What they seem to be applauding, however, is primarily the scholar's energy and comprehensiveness. Of course, they also grant Lean his genius, which I am loath to do.
At his best, in the magnificent "Oliver Twist," dominated by the incomparable Alec Guinness, Lean had the sense to meld his superb editing with a world-class performance of one of literature's great characters.
"Oliver Twist" has pace and wit — the very qualities that later grandiose pictures like "Dr. Zhivago" lack. It ought to be the purpose of biography to explain what happened to Lean. Or as David Thomson concludes, "I challenge anyone to see ‘Oliver Twist' and ‘Dr. Zhivago' and not admit the loss. It will take a very good biography to explain that process." Well, I am still waiting.
August 24, 2013
Phillips has a fascinating tale to tell, one that encompasses not just one director, but much of the history of filmmaking. It's a pity his writing is so clunky and that he has a penchant for stating (and restating) the obvious. (And he uses "laconically" so often that I wanted to mail him a thesaurus.) But on the plus side, he knows his subject very well, and for the most part manages to keep things interesting and informative.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews