LOLITA (1998) DVD region 1 question (1 Viewer)

[Charlie O.]

Is the region 1 Lolita (11998 version) uncut? And no, I am not a pedophile.

 

[Rob Lutter]

And no, I am not a pedophile.

LOL, I about spit out my coke when I read that! I've never seen the 1998 version, but in the Kubrick version, no sex is shown on-screen (I don't even think the word "sex" is ever even said in the film, they just hint at it).

 

[Dan Rudolph]

DO you mean 1997? There was no 1998 version, AFAIK.

The cover makes no mention of it being uncut, so I doubt it.

 

[Charlie O.]

1997, 1998, 11998, whichever.....i'm sure you all know which one i'm talking about.

 

[Glenn Overholt]

I understand the question but I have to ask - uncut from what? It is 137 minutes. How long is the R2 version?

Glenn

 

[Charlie O.]

I remember hearing something about when i was 1st shown on American cable TV that it was cut. I don't know if this is true or not.

 

[Jesse Blacklow]

From the IMDB:

# Though Dawn Mauer was used as a body double for all nude scemes featuring Lolita (Dominique Swain), director Adrian Lyne bowed to public pressure and cut all of them from the film for its U.S. release. They reportedly exist in its original European release.

# Two scenes involving nudity from the body double were originally intended to be included as supplemental footage in the UK DVD release but were refused a certificate by the BBFC.

So, it's doubtful those scenes exist anywhere but bootlegs. Otherwise, the movie is shown in it's theatrical presentation

 

[PaulP]

The DVD has several deleted scenes. This version is closer to Nabokov's novel, so it's my favorite of the two films, although Kubrick is one of my all-time favorite directors nonetheless.

 

[Rich Malloy]

This version is closer to Nabokov's novel, so it's my favorite of the two films, although Kubrick is one of my all-time favorite directors nonetheless.

I'm a big Kubrick fan, too, but I'm an even bigger Nabokov fan. And Lyne's film version of "Lolita" is a joke.

(That is, unless it's one of those "re-imaginings". But if Lyne believes it's an adaptation that's true to it's source, then the joke's also on him.)

So, presuming it's not intended as a "re-imagining", Lyne's film can only be viewed as an hilariously wrongheaded interpetation based on what can only be a naively literal reading of the novel.

Right off the bat, Lyne couldn't get things more wrong. In the introduction to his confession (the novel), Humbert Humbert longingly describes a lost love of his youth, suggesting in his typically self-serving way that this is the Freudian underpinnings of his later obsession with Lo. This, of course, is a tease. From his jail cell, the erudite and well-heeled Humbert is playing here for sympathy - and in a rather ridiculous manner. He doesn't even bother to make up a believable name, instead assigning the moniker "Annabel Leigh", a patently obvious allusion to Poe's greatest poem of lost love ("Annabel Lee") and, thus, a patently obvious fabrication.

Further, it allows Nabokov another opportunity to skewer Freudian psychoanalysis, a theme common to all his novels. It's a literary allusion masquerading as a self-diagnosed childhood trauma which Humbert professes to have caused his adult sickness. It's a play for sympathy, and a rather transparent and ridiculous one. To put it simply, all that stuff about "Annabel Leigh" is quite clearly bullshot. The reader is expected to laugh out loud, nod knowingly, and snicker at Nabokov's cleverness.

But, absurdly, Lyne takes it utterly seriously. Indeed, he makes it the underpinning of HH's 'tragic personal history'. It's a fundamental misreading of the text because it transforms the entire subsequent narrative into something which it not only is not, but which it is in fact mercilessly satirizing. That Lyne not only took this bit literally, but used it as the linchpin by which he converted Nabokov's brilliant satire into some common hamfisted tragedy is a joke.

(Or, a singularly lame "re-imagining".)

Nabokov's work is a multi-valent satire, skewering a variety of literary genres, and, ultimately, love itself (and our (mis)representations of it). Lyne's film, on the other hand, is a vapid, sentimentalized, and mawkish tragedy. Scenes that are written as broad humor in the novel have been translated as somber chamber drama in Lyne's 'Merchant Ivory' take. The precise dialog is employed, but given a meaning that Nabokov never intended. Or, more correctly, given only the superfical meaning. It is the uncomprehending literalness of a hack. The truth of the novel - if one could call it that - and it's brilliance, lies beneath this mawkish veneer.

I think Nabokov would've found Lyne's gross misreading hilarious... except to the extent that people might claim it accurately represented his novel. All VN's typical misdirection and literary game-playing, the subverting of genre and expectations, these are part and parcel of Nabokov's brilliance.

But Lyne's interpretation is the ideal superficial reading. Exact quotations ripped from context and given a voice that Nabokov never intended. Tragedy? Since when has Nabokov ever written anything so old-fashioned as that? And Lyne somehow managed to strip every ounce of humor from Nabokov's most hilarious novel.

And while it's true that the cinema codes of the day prevented Kubrick from a more graphic depiction of Humbert's obsession, Kubrick understood that this was hardly the heart of the novel. Indeed, Kubrick understood that it was, in fact, satire. His changes - and there were many - never betrayed the tone and intent of the novel; he never allowed it to droop into the tired cliche of a tragedy. And he never allowed moralistic or sentimental notions to subvert the satire. Kubrick recognized this to be crucial to any adaptation, though critics thought he allowed Sellers too wide a berth--a bit too over-the-top, too broad, too wacky. Perhaps. But at least he got it.

Sadly, most critics did not. So caught up were they in the notion that in this new Lolita, the director was able to depict a goodly amount of sex! sex! sex! that they declared it closer to the tone and spirit of the original. One wonders if they've ever even read the original.

There's at least one critic who grasped the ridiculousness of Lyne's interpretation - Alan Stone of MIT's BostonReview. And, fortunately, it's published online:

http://bostonreview.mit.edu/BR23.5/stone.html

 

[Charlie O.]

So there's no way to find this film uncut?

 

[Garry Cowell]

Well I liked it. The Morricone score helps tremendously.

 

[MichaelBryant]

I love this film as well. Definitely one of Lyne's better pictures. It deserves a better transfer than the current DVD.

 

[Paul_Scott]

Rich,
great post.

yeah, Lynes is a far more literal translation than Kubricks which ironically makes it even farther removed from the source.

isn't the screenwriter for this version a respected playwright or something?
an amazing display of hack work.

 

[MatthewLouwrens]

Rich - Thanks for the interesting post. I've always meant to read the Nabokov, loved the Kubrick, thought the Lyne was okay but found the whole sex thing a bit creepy . Your points really helped me understand why - they shouldn't have been taken seriously.