Angels and Insects (1995) is such a fascinating, visually striking movie, featuring excellent actors, and I’m extremely annoyed that it seems to never be available on streaming. The DVD is expensive and rare (so out of print, I guess), and it took me forever to find a version to watch. There’s currently one on YouTube with chunky Spanish subtitles that you can’t turn off, although the picture quality is otherwise quite good. This is all a real shame because this movie is unique and well worth watching. Critic Roger Ebert described it as “like the dark underside of a Merchant-Ivory film,” and I love that because on the surface, Angels and Insects is a very proper period drama, but it slowly reveals the rot at the heart of this Victorian family. If you’ve read the novella Morpho Eugenia (1992) by A. S. Byatt, upon which this film is based, then you know what happens. If not, just wait for it!
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There’s color in this frock flick!
Sucks that we have to go back 30 years (!?) for color.
A wonderful movie in its own weird way; the costumes and colors are lush but disturbing, too.
A S Byatt is a strange but wonderful writer, and Morpho Eugenia is a small masterpiece. So is this extraordinary film that I was lucky to see in the theatre when it came out. I have it on DVD, but it is formatted from before we had 16×9 ratio screens. It’s also a rare chance to see a young Mark Rylance, who found making films to be very frustrating; he wouldn’t return to the screen for a long time. This film put Kristen Scott Thomas on the map, leading to her getting The English Patient. What I love about the costumes is their butterfly colors, but reversed from the way they are in nature, with the women in the brilliant hues, rather than the males of the insect world.
The ‘surprise incest!’ vibes from this film are nearly as strong as the insectile energy from these costumes*; also, it’s a bit amusing that while Mr Mark Rylance looks a bit younger, he never actually looks YOUNG per se; extra also, shouldn’t we all know by now that colourful clothing in historic periods is a myth refuted by Hollywood?
Finally, is it just me or does Ms Patsy Kensit here look a bit like Ms Alice Eve in BELGRAVIA?
*This may, admittedly, be projecting backward from poor Helaena Targaryen, Queen of Hearts and Bug Princess in HOUSE OF THE DRAGON.