Plot
A corrupt young man somehow keeps his youthful beauty eternally, but a special painting gradually reveals his inner ugliness to all.
Release Year: 2009
Rating: 6.2/10 (20,967 voted)
Director:
Oliver Parker
Stars: Ben Barnes, Colin Firth, Rebecca Hall
Storyline Fresh-faced and innocent, Dorian Gray arrives in London to move into the house he has inherited. Almost immediately he falls under the influence of amoral and calculating Lord Henry Wotton, leading to a life of increasing debauchery and even violence. Through many years Gray stays as young-looking as ever, while a portrait painted when he arrived grows old, reflecting his increasing excesses. Eventually the picture, now secreted in his attic, becomes almost hideous to behold. When true love finally enters his life he realises he must guard his secret at all costs.
Writers: Oscar Wilde, Toby Finlay
Cast: Ben Barnes
-
Dorian Gray
John Hollingworth
-
Patrol Policeman
Cato Sandford
-
Rent Boy
Pip Torrens
-
Victor
Fiona Shaw
-
Agatha
Ben Chaplin
-
Basil Hallward
Caroline Goodall
-
Lady Radley
Maryam d'Abo
-
Gladys
Michael Culkin
-
Lord Radley
Colin Firth
-
Lord Henry Wotton
Emilia Fox
-
Lady Victoria Wotton
Nathan Rosen
-
Young Dorian
Jeff Lipman
-
Lord Kelso
(as Jeffrey Lipman Snr)
Louise Kempton
-
Prostitute
Douglas Henshall
-
Alan Campbell
Filming Locations: Basildon Park, Lower Basildon, Berkshire, England, UK
Opening Weekend: £883,148
(UK)
(13 September 2009)
(348 Screens)
Gross: $20,563,362
(Worldwide)
(22 August 2010)
Technical Specs
Runtime:
Did You Know?
Trivia:
This is the second film starring Rachel Hurd-Wood (Sybil Vane) that involves an eternally youthful male lead. The first was
Peter Pan.
Goofs:
Incorrectly regarded as goofs:
(At 16:00) When Dorian, Basil, and Lord Wotton are out for drinks in the bar/music hall you see Lord Wotton pouring alcohol from a "Hendrick's Gin" bottle; (it is a very distinctive dark glass bottle with a very distinctive diamond shaped label). "Hendrick's Gin" was not produced until 1999. The bottle is a standard apothecary bottle, and the label is also standard for the times. The bottle for Hendrick's is made to look like an old time apothecary bottle.
Quotes: Emily Wotton:
I hope I'm not interrupting your reminiscence? Lord Henry Wotton:
One charm of the past, is that it's the past. Emily Wotton:
Hmm... I hope you're not also a dreary old cynic? Dorian Gray:
What is there to believe in? Emily Wotton:
Our developments. Dorian Gray:
All I see is decay. Emily Wotton:
For the religion. Dorian Gray:
Fashionable substitute for believe. Emily Wotton:
Art. Dorian Gray:
Formality.
[...]
User Review
Who would have thought debauchery could be so dull?
Rating: 5/10
A young man's soul becomes trapped in his portrait. He goes on to lead
a life of corruption, staying young and immortal, while the painting
displays the consequences of his behaviour.
This film is beautifully shot, competently told, but it is boring, in
spite of the fact that it moves at such a fast pace. Significant
events, such as Dorian's relationship with Sybil, and the murder of
Basil, are glossed over in a matter of minutes. I get the impression
that the film makers were keen to get the boring story parts over as
quickly as possible so that they could get on with filming
scantily-clad women. There is little chance for any character or plot
development and as a consequence Dorian's descent into corruption seems
very false. Why does he look up to Henry so much and believe everything
he says? I'm presuming that Dorian sees him as a father figure, going
by the scenes shown of him being beaten by his uncle as a child (this
is never developed into anything significant), but then why Henry over,
for example, the much kinder Basil? Likewise, when Sybil kills herself,
we don't really care, as her relationship with Dorian was nothing more
than a brief contrivance to get them into bed together. As soon as you
saw she was playing Ophelia in the theatre, it was obvious she was
going to end up in the river.
For a Certificate 15, this film is very tame. None of the sex scenes
are particularly graphic and there is no excessive nudity. We see
Dorian at a variety of orgies all populated by people wafting about in
stupid costumes. In a predictable double standard, the movie is happy
to show women in various aspects of promiscuity, but Dorian's
homosexual behaviour is merely hinted at. Likewise, Dorian's drug use
is rarely ever shown. The strangest thing about this movie is that it
seems to focus on Dorian's love of sex, rather than his much worse
vices of drug abuse and murder, as the main reason for his corruption,
but frankly I've seen more debauchery in an Anne Summers catalogue.
Most of his sexual encounters are between consenting adults, so why is
this such a terrible thing? He "seduces" first Sybil and then the
daughter of one of his friends (and her mother), but these women are
portrayed as being so vapid and clueless that I didn't feel any
sympathy for them at all, especially Sybil who mentions how she's seen
what has happens to other girls in the gin houses who sleep around …
and then drops her caution (and her clothes) in a second just because
Dorian tells her he loves her, literally just after they've met! The
far worse reason for Dorian's downfall - the murder of his friend Basil
- is quickly skirted over. The murder comes out of the blue. Basil sees
the painting and offers help to Dorian, who promptly kills him. Why?
Throughout the film, Dorian never shows any shame or remorse about his
behaviour (until the end anyway) so why does he care if people see the
painting? There is no build-up, Dorian doesn't show any predilection
for violence and when the murder occurs, it seems out of character, as
does the cold way in which he disposes of the body, rather than, say,
panicking and having a guilty breakdown.
Considering some of the names on display, the acting isn't great. Ben
Barnes is pretty enough, until he takes his clothes off and the idea
that no woman or man can resist that scrawny body is laughable. He
looks about 12. I'm not a big fan of Colin Firth either who continues
his attempt to shake off the romantic hero typecasting he's got stuck
with (why is this so bad by the way?), but he just doesn't convince as
a bad guy, nor as someone charismatic enough to lead Dorian astray. His
daughter, Emily, is played by Rebecca Hall, the best actor in this
film, but unfortunately saddled with another wafer-thin character. To
begin with, she is portrayed as being a sensible, independent modern
woman … until she meets Dorian and then descends into the familiar role
of vacuous, unquestioning love interest that most of the actresses in
this film have been saddled with. It's also a shame the character of
Henry's wife wasn't built up a bit more - a few lines in the beginning
hint that she knows exactly what her husband has been up to and
disapproves of his influence on Dorian. It would have been more
interesting to have a few "light" characters to counterbalance all the
"dark" temptations that Dorian is subjected to, as well as providing a
moral framework to hang the good/bad conflict on. Lip service is paid
to the concept of the soul and religion, but is not explored in any
depth.
The one thing this movie excelled at was building up the evilness of
the painting. In a wonderful double-standard, Henry is shocked when he
sees it, in spite of the fact that he's the one who has been promoting
a life of debauchery from the start. I thought it was a shame that we
only saw Dorian become his real self for a short time. Perhaps
budgetary constraints were responsible for that. It's also a shame that
Emily never gets to see his "true" face and find out exactly what she
has fallen in love with, particularly as she did not seem to question
anything about his abhorrent behaviour before she jumped into bed with
him.
When we finally see the painting, it is a huge anticlimax. It's not
that corrupt, shocking or scary. Much like this movie in fact.
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