Attention home decorators: if you’ve been looking for a way to display beautiful works of art from the 19th century in your living room, then here’s all you need:

A television set (19-inch screen minimum)
A DVD player
A copy of Barry Lyndon

Simply insert the movie disc into the player, press Play, then hit Pause at any given point in the three-hour film. You’re guaranteed to have a freeze-frame picture as lovely as anything ever painted by the Hudson River School artists. Stanley Kubrick’s 1975 film is just one gorgeous landscape after another. In fact, John Alcott’s Oscar-winning cinematography is so sensually overwhelming that it’s easy to overlook the fact that Barry Lyndon is, at heart, a rather dull movie.

Give Kubrick points for trying, however. Adapting William Makepeace Thackeray’s 1844 novel to the screen must have seemed a daunting task. But then, Kubrick was always one of those bullheaded genius-artists who couldn’t be daunted. As with his other works, the director takes the reins of the picture between his teeth and doesn’t let go. The result is a large-scale film that travels its three-hour course slowly and deliberately.

I have nothing against “slow” films, per se (and certainly Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey is one of the slowest masterpieces I’ve ever seen)…but the trouble with Barry Lyndon is the fact that there is little emotional arc in those ponderous three hours. The vacancy at the heart of the movie begins to plague the viewer around the one-hour mark and by the time we reach the Intermission before plunging into Act Two, we’re either bored into a state of catatonia or we’re agitated at the thought of how good Barry Lyndon could have been, if only things had been slightly different.

And I can sum up the problem in one word: Casting.
Okay, two words: Ryan O’Neal.

But more on the actor later. First, I’d rather dwell on the good stuff of Barry Lyndon (of which, despite my harsh tone, there is an abundance).

I’ve always had a fondness for tales of loveable 18th-century rogues—Tom Jones, Valmont, Sam Pickwick, et al—and Kubrick artfully captures the world of duels, deceit and debauchery as his camera follows the fortunes and misfortunes of Barry Redmond (O’Neal), later to be known as Barry Lyndon after he marries Lady Lyndon (Marisa Berenson).

The film opens with two figures squaring off against each other with dueling pistols. We hear a narrator—an omniscient, ironic voice (Michael Hordern) which will instruct and delight us throughout the movie: the gentlemen on the right side of the screen, we’re told, “no doubt ... would have made an eminent figure in his profession…[boom!]... had he not been killed in a duel over the purchase of some horses.” The fellow gets a lead ball right between the eyes and falls to the ground. Barry’s father is dead, leaving the teenage boy hungry to make his own mark in the world. He determines to be a gentleman with property and reputation. First, however, he must be emotionally deflowered by his cousin, Nora (Gay Hamilton). Barry falls madly in love with the older girl and when his romantic intentions are threatened by an Army officer, Captain Quinn (Leonard Rossiter), Barry challenges the suitor to a duel, thus mirroring the opening shot nicely.

The duel ends badly for Captain Quinn and Barry is forced to flee from his home in Ireland.

Narrator: “He was destined to be a wanderer.”

With twenty guineas in his pocket, Barry sets out into the wide world, “thinking of tomorrow and all the wonders it would bring.” It’s not long before the naive youth is robbed and set adrift into that now-narrower world. From here, the movie steadily charts Barry’s course in life, from youth to middle-age, as he finds himself in a variety of stations in life: Irish officer, Prussian corporal, spy, gambler, duelist, swordsman, Casanova.

But Barry is an unsympathetic cad. When he marries the Lady Lyndon, he relegates her to a role which, in his mind, has no more importance than his estate’s elegant furnishings. Beneath a thundercloud of hair, Berenson is beautiful in the role of the ultimate trophy wife, but this is Barry’s story and we never get to know her enough to pity her. It’s Barry’s ambition, pride and downfall that take center frame.

Narrator: “Through his own energy, he raised himself to a higher sphere of society.”

The movie also ascends to a higher sphere of cinema as Alcott captures a world that is so particularly beautiful that I was ready to crawl through my TV screen and live there forever, duels and all. The landscapes dominate Barry Lyndon, placing the characters solidly in another century when the world was more pastoral and less cluttered with pavement.

Despite the snail pace, I also enjoyed Kubrick’s authority and command, evident in every careful still-life composition. There is very little camera movement, putting us at the perimeter of the action as spectators. Many shots slowly zoom out from the characters to reveal the settings, showing us how Barry fits into the opulently-furnished rooms or the lush countryside.

Kubrick typically filled his movies with silence—check out 2001’s stunning beginning where the first word of dialogue doesn’t come until about 25 minutes into the picture—and Barry Lyndon is certainly no exception. Many scenes pass with a minimal amount of dialogue. Meaning is expressed in glances, the arrangement of bodies, the lingering touch of fingers.

Alas and alack, Mr. O’Neal seemed to have interpreted Kubrick’s request for understated expression as a command to fill his performance with a series of blank faces. When Kubrick said “Wordlessness,” O’Neal thought he said “Woodenness.” I’ll admit the actor was never one of my favorite 70s thespians. With the exception of Paper Moon, most of his on-screen time was consumed by the blight of bland. Whether this was an intentional style of acting or a Hollywood accident of always being miscast, it’s hard to say. Either way, the method is wrong for Barry Lyndon. While the exuberant, cartoon-pitch of Albert Finney’s Tom Jones would have been all wrong for Kubrick’s serious tone, one would have hoped for an actor who would do more than serve as an enigmatic wooden sculpture. Especially if we’re going to be looking at him for three hours.

In terms of greatness, Barry Lyndon is about midway down the list of Kubrick’s films, but it is not the disaster contemporary critics called it. It is puzzling, ponderous and occasionally pretentious, but it is well worth watching. At the very least, it makes a very nice addition to the gallery of beautiful movies.



Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD