Merchant Ivory Productions

They ARE Merchant Ivory Productions!

Similar films that immediately come to my mind include

The Age of Innocence

A Passage to India

Gosford Park

Washington Square

House of Mirth

The Enchanted April

84 Charring Cross Road

The Secret Garden

The Wings of the Dove

Maggie Smith as Cousin Charlotte in A Room with a View will always be a favorite of mine

The first 30 minutes in or so of Howard's End maybe some of the best period film ever.

[quote] (and similar) films

Alec Scudder stepping in to meet Maurice's needs was incredibly inspiring to teenage me. Plus I can absolutely become absorbed in the luxury. The lush scores and quality of the filmmaking are so nostalgic to my childhood as well.

[quote] (and similar) films

Remains of the Day - greatest movie of the last 50 years

“ rare commodities in today's increasing TAWDRY marketplace”

MARY!

Love watching an ethereal Vanessa Redgrave float over the flowers at the start of Howards End to Grainger's gorgeous Bridal Lullaby.

The passionate kiss in the poppy field while Kiri te Kawana belts out Puccini in A Room with a View is filmmaking at its finest.

All to be ruined by Maggie Smith's LUCY!

[quote] Maggie Smith's LUCY!

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R10 Here you go!

Yes! And yes! And yes!

That's the stuff, R13. Thanks!

Ismail Merchant and James Ivory were very well regarded and respected by the industry.

Their films were made on a small budget, but they attracted major talent who could have made way more money elsewhere:

Paul Newman, Joanne Woodward, Julie Christie, Lee Remick, Ralph Fiennes, Vanessa Redgrave, Emma Thompson, Christopher Reeve, Greta Scacchi, Anthony Hopkins, Alan Bates, Denholm Elliott, Nick Nolte, Ben Kinglsey, Jeremy Northam, and Prunella Scales, to name a few.

So...languid.

I've always had a soft spot for The Bostonians.

Vanessa Redgrave, Christopher Reeve, Madeline Potter, Wesley Addy, Linda Hunt, Nancy Marchand, Wallace Shawn, and Jessica Tandy

Thanks to Tubi (which I first started streaming a couple of months ago) I found about 10 Merchant-Ivory films that I put on "My List" to watch, including some things I've either never seen before or haven't seen in years.

They include Quartet, Autobiography of a Princess, Heat and Dust, Bombay Talkie and Shakespeare Wallah.

Last month I saw The White Countess and the underwhelming Slaves of New York - although the latter did have that fabulous Supremes scene.

I've never seen it, but I've always felt In the Mood for Love was Merchant Ivory-esque

I wish Tom Crewe's 2023 novel The New Life had been published 25 years ago so Merchant Ivory could adapt it for film. It would have been fantastic.

Their movies always looked gorgeous.

MAURICE, first, last and foremost.

R23 why?

I enjoyed 1990's Mr. and Mrs. Bridge tremendously. Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward in the title roles.

It's not your standard Merchant-Ivory film since it's set in America rather than Britain. But it's lush and detailed with a superb script by Ruth Prawer Jhabvala.

R24, it's a romantic film to me.

R21, I loved Crewe’s The New Life better than anything I’ve read in the last couple of years. I immediately reread it, and have gifted it to three friends.

I’d love to see it adapted, but it would likely be a miniseries today. Could happen, and could still be done beautifully, even with Merchant/Ivory out of the running.

I often recall a line delivered in Howard’s End by a batty old aunt who has come out to the country to straighten out a domestic complication involving an offer of marriage that should never have been made to one of her young nieces, and is given a ride out to the house by a member of the other family.

The young man providing her the ride from the train station via his topless motorcar is no less confused than auntie and a horrible disagreement develops. Voices are raised.

Finally, she declares, “I decline to argue with such a person” and does her very best to contrive to leave the car while it’s in motion.

I often wish that sentiment would be generally adopted in the Datalounge when I’m watching a thread devolve into personal insults and name calling.

^cunt

R29 likes mackerel.

R38 That aunt was Prunella Scales, one of the great British character actresses and comediennes

She's also the mother of the guy who played Leonard Bast, Samuel West.

R32 an the wife of Timothy West

I have always thought Ismail Merchant was a beautiful man

What I really admire about them is the amount of care they give to works of literature that people find very meaningful to them. You can tell they saw it as a sacred trust.

R35 I agree. Would have loved a Proust adaptation

I enjoy the films, but they usually aim at whole-production values to the extent that story and character are contextualized to the extent they lose prominence.

This gives them a cozy feeling that may not align with thematic concerns. It also makes the considerable pleasure of watching them a comfortable quality many viewers prefer, or can be satisfied with.

They made ponderous movies one felt obligated to like

Remains of the Day is just fabulous, but it benefited, I think, from Mike Nichols being a producer on it (and he was supposed to direct it too--he was attached for a while). It's more visceral (more American?) than A Room With a View, I think, though I love that movie.

R39 Do you think Remains of the Day or Howards End is the better film?

I briefly dated a pretty cool guy who became Ivory's historical consultant for his films. he was a PRETTY fancy guy, but was obsessed with historical details (as a matter of fact I swear he's posted a time or two on the DL)

My eye isn't that discerning, but where it is you can see the sheer joy that the period consultants have in being able to show what they know onscreen.

James Ivory’s Instagram was funny. He used to post pictures of hideous designer clothes in storefronts and pictures from his travels.

The Remains Of The Day is one of the greatest films of the last 40 films.

The productions were often chaotic and the actors didn’t get paid but the prestige darling, the prestige.

R44 films or years?