how is this the 'best' version of the story?
because it won an oscar?
shareBecause of its no-holds-barred approach to the disturbing underlying themes.
shareno holds barred?i don't think so.way too romantic,makes jekyll out to be a saint,when he is inherently anything but.and hyde's appearence is unrealistic and grotesquely literal minded.that said,it is enjoyable and entertaining enough...but by no means the best.there have been some very fine film versions of the story,but the book is still the best,and i'm normally not one of these"the book is always better"people.the spencer tracy version,a direct remake of this was a better handling of the"romantic"adaptation material.more subtle,better dialogue,PRONOUCES JEKYLL'S NAME RIGHT,with a more realistic(and scarier)hyde,and the hyde/ivy relationship makes the one from '31 look like a sitcom.yet for whatever reason it's always compared unfavorably to that version.
shareActually you're wrong, most fans of Robert Louis Stevenson's novella know, that the way Jekyll (Jee-kyll) is pronounced in this film, is actually the CORRECT PRONUNCIATION of the name as Stevenson intended, it was the Richard Mansfield stage play adaptation that popularised the way it's pronounced in modern times.
sharesays who? and anyway,for better or worse everyone has always pronounced it jeh-kyll...better,i think because jee-kyll sounds stupid.
shareRegardless of which way sounds better, and I myself prefer the more popular modern way too, you can't say it's wrong just because you dislike the original pronunciation.
sharesays who?
Pick a source, pretty much any source that actually talks about the history of the material. Even people who tend to say "Jeh-kill" themselves will point out that it was originally "Jee-kuhl".
everyone has always pronounced it jeh-kyll
Well, no. The Brits are still more prone to using the long "E" sound. A few years ago there was British TV show (I think they only did one series of it) called "Jekyll" doing a modern update (as I recall, with the implication that their central character was a direct descendant of Stephenson's it-turns-out-non-fictional subject). In that show they always use the long "E" pronunciation.
As to the original question:
I prefer '31 over '40-whatever (forget the exact year off the top of my head) for a few reasons. Because it is pre-code, '31 can be more direct and honest about a lot of what is going on (from prostitution to the sexual nature of some of Hyde's attacks; for one thing Ingrid Bergman wanted to play against type by taking the hooker role, but the Production Code wouldn't allow her to actually *be* a hooker at all). Thematically, I like the less ambiguous doctor; if he and Hyde are supposed to be opposites the let them be *opposites*, a less "white" Jekyll ought to imply a less "black" Hyde and I don't see it. I like a lot of the less straight forward camera work / cinematography in the '31: the subjective camera stuff at the beginning, the optical and lighting effects in the transformation scenes for instance. While I had no problem with Ingrid Bergman as the "party girl" in Notorious, I didn't see her really pulling off the London underclass bar maid and part time prostitute, the person that would be a corrupting influence on Jekyll (Miriam Hopkins comes closer to that, possibly because she was allowed to *do* more in the Pre-Code era). share
With regard to Jekyll being a "saint," personally to an extent I disagree. I didn't find Jekyll particularly saintly in this film. He can be selfish, he's impatient, feels rage, anger and lust. Yes he is a doctor and cares a great deal about his patients. He is passionate about altering the human soul... partly due to the drive and ambition he feels as he figures out it is scientifically possible to achieve this. Remember before he takes the drug, he is desperate to marry Muriel and can't stand her father constantly delaying the wedding as he wants to do what a man wants to do. Also when Ivy kisses him, he does not resist it and seems quite giddy about it afterwards.
shareThank you! The Jekyll of this film is anything but a saint. He's lustful (a big Victorian no-no), a quality about him that he's reluctant accept, but unwilling to ignore, hence his experiments. He's eager to marry Murial because he wants to get it on with her. He doesn't back away when Ivy tries to seduce him in her room, but rather sticks around quite enjoying himself as she gets naked in front of him. And, most telling of all, after once again being told to wait for Murial's hand in marriage, he drinks the potion and becomes Hyde just so he can go out and enjoy all the sins that London has to offer without running the risk of ruining his reputation as the good doctor. The man is clearly not a saint.
shareExactly rlegel271!
I do appreciate that he regretted it in the end but he pretty much did what he did not just for experiment sake but because he had issues and an ego the size of Texas.
Says R.L.Stevenson who wrote the freakin' book! that's who.
Stevenson was from Edinburgh, Scotland. That's how it's pronouced!
Stevenson wasn't English; he was a Scot and would have pronouncced it JEE-kill. The English have a ferocious habit of modifying foreign names and changing the pronounciation to fit their language. We all know Henry VIII's second wife as Anne Boleyn (bo -LIN), but many early sources say it as BULL-in; I have several older books that even changed the spelling to match the pronounciation, and have it as Anne Bullen.
shareYes the 1931 version has the right pronunciation as Stevenson intended. The names Jekyll and Hyde were supposed to rhyme with Seek and Hide.
shareBack to the thread: Yes it is the best version of them all, and there are so many, even discounting all silent versions.
Name one other version with a better "monster",
a Hornier Jekyll (He and his fiance´ keep saying -I love you! I love you soo
much!! for minutes in a scene! Why? Because the director was stupid? No, he wanted us to see how sexually into eachother they were, but also frustrated!),
a bold and daring sexual interpretation of the Jekyll/ Hyde tale,
and all in all a wonderfully sewn together and beautiful film with some great actors,
with timeless transformation scenes that baffled moviegoers and critics for a half decade, until it was revealed that it was partially made with certain makeup paint and camera filters,
with a more powerful beginning: When the film starts, we watch everyting from Jekylls POV, something we never saw in a film older than this or in any 1930s film!...until he stops by the mirror and we see who it is!
Can you imagine that this classic of early horror films was considered LOST for decades?
How is Dr. Jekyll a saint? He is shown to be impatient, temperamental, impulsive, flirtacous outside of his fiance, and even someone who likes to shock people with the unconventional. This doesn't make him either a Saint or a sinner, he is both, he is the conventional man who struggles daily with conventions of society, of what we expect from ourselves, what others expect from us, and what the world expects from us.
share