Tess, based on the novel by Thomas Hardy, directed by Roman Polanski - Eight out of 10

Tess, based on the novel by Thomas Hardy, directed by Roman Polanski

Eight out of 10

A philosophy professor has once remarked on the beauty of this excellent film, winner of three Academy Awards, the Golden Globes for Best Foreign Film and New Star of the Year for Nastassja Kinski.

That philosopher used to try to instill the communist ethics, morals – although that failed system is actually immoral and unethical – into the undersigned and his colleagues, which means she had not had a good vision or perspective on life, but she was right in regards to the Roman Polanski achievement.

The latter is of course a more than controversial figure, given that he has committed statutory rape, he cannot travel to the US on that account, has been briefly detained in Europe and has created masterpieces, but has had personal failures as well.

Tess is dedicated to the late, killed wife of the director, Sharon Tate, and it is an accomplished, very good film, although perhaps not on the same level as the quintessential Chinatown, Cul-de-Sac or The Pianist.

In the opening scenes, John Durbeyfiled, a drunkard with a lazy manner, learns from a cleric with a penchant for studying old documents and genealogy that he is the descent of a once rich, noble family called d’Urberville and when he insists, he finds that he could be the last, there is no mansion, fortune or anything else left.

Nevertheless, the family is in dire straits, given that their horse had just died, the head of the household is not very diligent and they decide to send Tess aka Nastassja Kinski to the d’Urberville mansion in a village not too far, to try and establish a connection between relatives, members of the same old, noble tree.

The heroine meets Alec d’Urberville when she arrives at the manor house, a man who is evidently arrogant, womanizer, pretentious, determined, interested in the visitor, although he tells her to forget about the aristocratic background of her family, keen on establishing dominance over her and giving her some strawberries to eat from his hand, initiating an erotic game, in which he would try to entangle the innocent, ignorant girl…cousin as he sometimes mocks her.

When she returns to her home, the protagonist and her family receive a letter from the “relative” – although they are actually called Stoke and they had bought the old name – proposing that the young woman comes to the mansion, starts working at the poultry farm and if that “internship „proves satisfactory, she would move on to a different position with a suitable, attractive income.

Although Tess is not happy with the prospect, considering the near destitution of the family, she starts working at the chicken farm, attracting the attention of the lustful, predatory nouveau riche, who takes advantage one night, as the girl is returning with other employees from a dance and she is attacked and insulted by another woman, who was envious and irate on account of the better looks, manners and appearance of the protagonist.

Seeing that this is moment of weakness, the guard of the girl that had rejected his advances is down after she had preferred to walk instead of having to grab him when he drove her too fast in his buggy, the master of the house takes the heroine on his horse, decides to ride through the forest, on a long route and then forces himself upon the defenseless girl, who would ultimately run from the service and give birth to his child.

This is a terrible tragedy, for Tess d’Urberville would struggle in life, contemplating suicide at various times, accepting catastrophic circumstances in order to try to help her family, which at one point is evacuated, when the useless father dies and there is no more money to pay for the lodgings and the mother and children are forced to spend the night in the open, near a church.

The protagonist finds work as a milk girl, after her baby had died, and this is where she meets Angel Clare – Peter firth does not seem brilliantly fitted for this part, at times he seems to express only pain, when the emotions that are supposed to emanate would be more subtle, complex and including a love, fascination that appear to be out of the realm of possibilities for the actor, at least in this production.

As the employees and owner of the farm eat their lunch, the talk at the table centers on the soul and this is when Tess has a very interesting, profound and original contribution, mentioning that when she looks at the sky, she feels at times that her soul is escaping from her body, travelling high up – she did not use these words, perhaps this was not even her meaning, but it is what is left here, in this note nevertheless.

Angel Clare is stupefied by this small speech, becomes infatuated with the attractive, delicate, decent, modest, shy, special girl and confesses to her when he takes the party of girls going to the church across a large water filled hole, thereafter they get ever closer, up to the point where she tries to confess that she had been abused by the rich Stoke, had the baby, but she cannot find the courage, being afraid that she would lose him if he finds the truth.

Alas, when he does, after the wedding, just as they prepare to go to bed, the superficial, cruel Angel Clare refuses to give his forgiveness, travels outside the house and when confronted by his wife, he just says that he fell in love with a different woman – here we could note that there is a grain of truth, for the vileness of his attitude.

Harvard Professor Tal-Ben Shahar mentions this aspect in his positive psychology lectures – available on the internet – which makes people present what looks like a different person to the one they love, in the hope that they would entice, seduce them, with the effect that the desired person becomes indeed attracted to the fictitious figure and not with the real person, who had tried so hard to embellish the self that has ended in actually making a match between the would be lover and…someone else.

Tess is heartbroken, desparate, writing and begging her departed husband, now travelling around Brazil, to return, answer her, and she lives in extreme poverty, abused and finally traced again by the villain of the story, who offers to help the family without a home, in exchange for the favors of the desolate Tess.

A sublime story, if extremely sad and devastating.