THE AISLE SEAT - "LOLITA"
by Mike McGranaghan
The journey of Adrian Lyne's Lolita has been a long one. Made in 1996, it took two years for the film to find an American distributor. Although based on the famous novel by Nabokov, the movie's pedophilic plot was considered too inflammatory for most studios, who feared a public backlash. Lyne and star Jeremy Irons even appeared on an episode of "Nightline" to decry what they felt amounted to censorship of their film. Finally, a deal was struck, and after a one-week run in L.A. to qualify for Oscar consideration (yeah, right), Lolita played on the Showtime cable channel. Now it's going back into theaters.
Irons stars as Humbert Humbert, perhaps literature's most famous pervert. While staying as a house guest of Miss Charlotte Haze (Melanie Griffith), he becomes obsessed with her young daughter Dolores a.k.a. Lolita (Dominique Swain). The girl is a child, but has sexual ideas beyond her years. She senses Humbert's attraction and plays to it, doing things she knows are provocative to him. Humbert marries the Charlotte, just to be close to Lolita. After the mother's tragic death, Humbert and Lolita make a cross-country trek together, and their relationship becomes even more blatantly sexual. They also encounter another pedophile - the devious Clare Quilty (Frank Langella) - who becomes Humbert's competition for the nymphette's affections.
Let's first address the issue of taste. Although the subject matter made me a little queasy (as it is supposed to), I don't think Lolita is exploitative, and I certainly don't think it's child pornography. However, I also don't think it's a good idea to make a film version of this story in this day and age. Yes, artists have the right to explore material that is controversial or difficult or challenging. I've even supported filmmakers who have done this in the past (Oliver Stone's Natural Born Killers and Paul Thomas Anderson's Boogie Nights come instantly to mind) and will continue to do so in the future. However, Nabokov has already explored this subject; to re-hash it is in questionable taste. Lyne's film asks us to sympathize with Humbert even as we condemn his actions (After all, the picture seems to say, he's not as bad as Quilty is. I find the comparison between pedophiles unnerving and troublesome.). The sexual molestation of children is such a problem today that I'm not convinced this is the right way to address an important subject.
Setting aside my reservations about the subject matter (and I assure you that I did set them aside as I watched Lolita), I have to say that the controversial nature of the film isn't the problem; the fact that it's so damn boring is. Child molestation is about as hot-button a topic as you can get. This being the case, why is Lolita so painfully, wretchedly dull?
I think a big part of the problem is that Adrian Lyne is the wrong director to tackle this story. He makes it too stylish and glossy. Sexual abuse is ugly, not pretty. Lyne's sleek visual sense works well for pop-culture fluff like Indecent Proposal but not for something that requires substance or depth. He's in over his head here. To get the point across, the director even stoops to using overly-obvious symbolism: dripping wet underwear hanging from a rod, chocolate syrup spurting from a dispenser, Lolita seductively sucking a banana. Just in case you don't get the point, you know?
Even worse is the depiction of Quilty. When we first meet him, Lyne intercuts between the character and a gigantic bug zapper as it melodramatically fries fake-looking bugs. That's not all. Frank Langella is a fine actor, but for some reason he starts overacting wildly at the end, screaming like a banshee and giving the audience "the full monty". There's a ridiculous confrontation between Quilty and Humbert that seems like something out of an old Ed Wood picture.
Jeremy Irons, on the other hand, is actually pretty good, giving Lolita pained looks of longing. Irons is a master of suggesting inner emotional turmoil, and he does good work here. The script and direction let him down, though. The movie grinds on and on laboriously for almost two-and-a-half hours. It just keeps treading the same ground, never adding anything new to the relationship between its characters, never breaking out into anything dramatically interesting. A story like this lives or dies by its central character; because it is so boring, that can only mean that Humbert Humbert's passion is not on the screen.
Lolita ultimately fails because it's not deep enough. It gets into what its characters do, but not the reasons why they do it. I was bored out of my mind watching it. For all the controversy, this movie is far more languid than stirring. Despite Lyne's insistence that this is an important film, Lolita only manages to be a depiction of a pedophile, not a meaningful portrayal of one.
(
out of four)
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