Today in class, we viewed the first portion of the film The Barretts of Wimpole Street about the courtship of Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning. Given what you have viewed, please write a 10-15 minute reflection on the film. You can discuss your thoughts about the characters, setting, action, etc. of the film, the biographies of these poets, love, family, poetry, or go wherever else thinking about the film takes you. Feel free to refer to what you already know about Elizabeth Barrett Browning from reading Sonnet 43 and researching her biography. You are especially encouraged to think further about specific aspects of the poem. We probably won't be viewing this film further in class, so here's the first in a youtube playlist of the full film for you to continue enjoying.
Monday, November 23, 2009
The Barretts of Wimpole Street
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The film shows a different side to Elizabeth Barett Browning than the poem, obviously the poem doesnt provide information about herself as a person, but she appears more cheery in the film, atleast when her siblings are about. What a number of siblings he has too!
ReplyDeleteElizabeth is displayed as the loved elder sister, bedbound inside her wealthy fathers luxiurious home in the 1840s, no doubt luxurious because of his profitable ventures in the plantation industry. As far as i have seen up to in the film, ELizabeth appears lonely and tired of her illness, which everybody thinks is bringing her to the brink of death. The only person she seems to see the majority of the time is her maid, but seh still loves her brothers and sisters. She also shares a view with her siblings, that their father is too controlling, not allowing any of his children to marry and making lLizabeth drink porter every night as medicine.
In the poem, elizabeth does not appear to have that lonely tiredness, but a strong poetic passion which she displays for Robert Browning. And (at least in Sonnet 43 and 29) she doesnt talk about herself as a person, or any physical objects nearby, but rather her love and the description of that love (even using nature to describe some aspects.
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ReplyDeleteThe movie about the courtship of Elizabeth Barrett and Robert Browning, called "The Barretts of Wimpole Street", was a movie i didn't intend to know that i would be this interesting. Usually these old movies i would think are more complicated and difficult to understand but this one you understood completely. The way the very large family had their own individual problems about their relationships etc. The characters in this movie are so different from each other. Elizabeths youngest sister is fun, wild and free, loving to state her mind in things while Elizabeth herself is wise, caring and a smart middle-aged women. But these two sisters share everything with each other as well with the rest of the siblings.
ReplyDeleteThe setting of the movie is pretty far back around 1845. In the movie it is shown what time of year it is, which is winter and its snowing outside. But the main set is in Elizabeths room where she is lying sick. Inside it looks very victorian, as well with the dresses and the hair of everyone. The movie itself is black- and- white.
When i watch this film it reminds me of the movie'Little Women'. The way it is quite old-fashioned in a way and how the family is very big with many sisters and brothers. The younger sister who is vigorous and free and so inlove. But also about the older sisters wise and clever in their middle- ages. In little women one of them also falls sick. Since the two movies are made from complete different centuries/decades, they might not have all these resemblances but I dont know why, the barretts of wimpole street reminds me of little women.
What i especially love about this film is how the brothers and sisters get along so well with each other, however many they are. They are all really close and care for their sick sister, Elizabeth. But how the dad doesn't fit in this love circle makes the movie even more dramatic and filled with suspense. The father seems like a very demanding and controlling man, believing that his ways are the best e.g. about the 'porter' which was a disgusting drink but which he believed would make Elizabeth better. Elizabeths character is very loving, caring, and wise. The way she handles this sickness and for so many years she seems so patient with everything. No matter how many times people tell her she is going to die. This was a really good movie that i enjoyed a lot. This i can prove with everything that i have written. Thank you for showing it to us :)
The film the Barretts of Whimpole Street is about Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and her courtship with Robert Browning, and Elizabeth’s family. She seems a lot happier than the poem depicted her to be (although the poem doesn’t have anything written about her, but the way she writes seems almost depressing).
ReplyDeleteThe film is set in the mid 19th century, around 1840, and shows the story of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s life and love for Robert Browning. She is stuck to her room, lying in bed as of illness, which everyone else interprets to be a fatal sickness. Her father, who denies Elizabeth to be with Robert, believes that alcohol is a cure, that Elizabeth hates, so she is forced to take it. Her many younger siblings also believe that he is too controlling, although they all still love him. She seems very lonely, and the only person that frequently visits her and cares for her is her maid, who seems to be a nice person towards Elizabeth. She often shows her love towards Robert Browning, and when she gets the letter from him, she gets very excited, and says that she is not worthy of him.
The poems that she writes seem to show her great love towards Robert Browning, and she felt very passionate towards him. She admired him, and when she realised that he admired mer poetry, she felt that it was not true, and that he far exceeded her. She came from a wealthy family, and she seems to love, yet disagree with her father a lot.
The Barretts of Wimpole Street
ReplyDeleteThe last literature lesson we watched part of the film 'The Barrets of Wimpole Street' and the film was really good. I especially liked the dog at the beginning of the film. :)
The film was about Elizabeth Barret Browning in 1845. She was shown as sick and lonely, but already very interested in poetry. She wrote own poems and she was very excited that Robert Browning liked her poems. She also had A LOT OF siblings which cared about her and they had all very expensive dressings and also the house was very big. The family seemed to be very rich. Then there was her father who was very controlling for example he forced her drink poter because he thought it was good for.
What I realized is that they all talked very formal to each other. The siblings had to call their own father 'sir' and show a lot of respect to him. Even the siblings talked in a very formal way to each other.
The film was much about love and relationships. There was this love between the siblings because they cared so much for each other and they all prayed for Elizabeth. Then there was the love they showed to their father even if he was so controlling and in my opinion even mean. And then there were some relationships of the girls. Elizabeth herself talked only about one man: Robert Browning.
This is what her poem "Sonnet 43" is about which she wrote in 1850.It is all about her love to a man and most likely this man is Robert Browning.
I think the poem is much more serious than the film. ELizabeth is very cheerful in the film most of the time. Maybe that's because she was older when she wrote the poem.
Both, film and poem, are a lot about love.
I really liked the film, it showed me another way of Elizabeth. Before I saw the film I knew Elizabeth Barret Browning just as a name, an author. Now I can imagine her more real and her love is more clear to me.
Barretts of Whimole Street
ReplyDeleteThe Film we watched in class was called “Barretts of Whimole Street.” It is about a girl called Elizabeth Barrett Browning and her family. She is very ill throughout the film and hardly ever leaves her room. She knows a guy called Robert Browning who she has a crush on, they are both poets and they both send poets to and throw between them. Her illness isn’t very major but the whole family, and the people make a big deal about it like it is very serious, the maid of the house mainly looks after her.
Elizabeth wants to with her crush Robert but her dad is very controlling, as we see in the scene where the family are having fun and they all get told off for dancing. Her dad forces her to drink alcohol as he thinks its the cure to illness, she has no choice but to drink it. Her family are also very weathly and there are 7 brothers, 4 sisters (of what I could count.)
goodluck with learning poem guys :(
The Barretts of Wimpole Street.
ReplyDeleteMovie "The Barretts of Wimpole Street " is showing to us all family from Elizabeth Barrett. It tells us her history. In some things it reminds me about poem but sometimes we can find differences between them.
From this movie we can see all her family and it’s very big. There are so many brothers and sisters, at all there are 12 people I think. Her father is very strict with every one. All people afraid of him even dog we can see her behavior. Dog run away as soon as their father entered the room and it came back when he left. Also everyone stop joking and dancing around when they saw him. Elizabeth in love with Robert Browning and they are sending to each other poems. Father still doesn’t allow anyone from his daughters to get married. These parts are the same with the poem.
However Elizabeth seemed to be very different. She is sick in the movie because she always has medicine ( drink) but I think they exenterating it. Everyone keeps reminding her that she will soon die. Her father was praying to god. Her sisters and brothers always pity her.
I liked this movie and the poem. They all are very good.
Polina.
I watched the first part of the movie "The Barretts of Wimpole Street", I wouldn't say it was my favourite movie of all time to watch, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it would be.
ReplyDeleteThe movie is basically about Elizabeth Barrett, she is the main character and when I read the poem I thought that maybe she loves who she is addressing the poem to, so much, because she seems lonely and forgotten, but in the movie I realize that there are many people around her. Maybe she is still lonely because even though there are many people, there is no one really who she spends all her time with, though she is friendly with one of her sisters, she still feels bad because all of the other children(not quite children), are healthy and live full lives, unlike her, she has been ill and was sitting in the same room for ages. So she still seems lonely to me, you can go mad easily in a situation like that, especially with so little forms of communication with the world(no internet or television). So poetry was really saving her, it was like her life belt I suppose. And we can see in the movie that her father considered poetry as stupid, but she still loved it.
The character I loved the most was a dog, Flush. When I saw his/her name in the titles, I thought of flushing the toilet to be honest, and then I thought, did they had toilets at that time? Then I googled it up, and the toilet we are more familiar with nowadays was invented in late 19th century, so if her father was a wealthy guy, they must have had a toilet. I know it is a little off topic.
Somehow the movie didn’t at all make me feel love, I only thought about how uncomfortable but beautiful the fashion was at that time, also toilets and the status. The status played quite an important role in her life because her father was rich, and she wanted to marry a poor guy which is strange if you think about it, but now we have so many movies and stories based on that idea, so it’s not as much of a surprise to people nowadays, as it might have been for people in 1840 or when the movie was shown. Also I thought that the cinema was so boring, people could watch one movie all over again simply because television was not common.
But anyways, I kind of enjoyed the movie, but at the same time I wasn’t so interested in it, but at least I’m being honest.