How can a romance succeed when it never even begins? This is the question that lies at the center of this intricate tale that parallels the goings-on at Darlington Hall within the servants and the diplomats who convene there where Mr. Stevens, the butler who Anthony Hopkins brings to deeper focus, works at -- work being a mild operative, since he has forgone any external manifestation of emotion and personality in lieu of becoming the "perfect servant". This, needless to say, is the very trait that ruins his life and locks him up in the gilded cage where he is doomed to continue on even when the world has moved on, without him no doubt. In many ways, this could be a gentler, more touching variation of what Robert Altman would produce in 2001 as GOSFORD PARK with the crucial difference that where Altman's film focuses on a murder mystery and paintbrushes light strokes of colour over a large ensemble, Merchant-Ivory's REMAINS OF THE DAY is a romance tainted with darker, political overtones, the tie being solely the period where England was inching delicately towards war and the old society -- tradition -- was about to collapse to make way to the new way.
Based on Kazuo Ishiguro's novel of the same name, REMAINS OF THE DAY's plot is deceptively simple: it presents an older Stevens who is on his way to reconnect with an old friend and former co-worker, Mrs. Benn (Emma Thompson), nee Kenton, Darlington Hall's housekeeper. Through a series of vignettes we get to see how it was "in the old days", how Mrs. Kenton came to Darlington Hall, how she and Stevens initially did not get along due to the fact that Stevens' father was a sick man under Stevens' employ and was beginning to falter in his duties as the under-butler. However, as time went by, they would become quite a working team, and through subtle hints both suggest there may be more, however under-developed. We also get to see how Lord Darlington (James Fox), a somewhat pompous man, was progressively revealed to be a Nazi sympathizer and would make some ruining mistakes of his own -- a thing not lost on the American congressman Lewis (Christopher Reeve) who one evening, as a toast to Lord Darlington, calls the European diplomats "amateurs" because they are operating on goodwill and not practicality.
REMAINS OF THE DAY seems to be lacking in plot because in fact, it moves at its own pace much in the style of Merchant-Ivory movies. However, there is quite a bit happening here -- it's just not that evident at first glance. Because at its core, it's a story of people caught in a microcosm of the mundane as veiled, sinister events not to their full understanding are insinuating themselves at the very edges of the frame, there are times when it seems the story dwells too long on mediations of characters tics -- for example, the spat between Mrs. Kenton and Mr. Stevens about Mr. Stevens, Senior's forgetfulness over a Chinaman bobble head, itself a rung on the ladder of Mr. Stevens, Senior's eventual demotion. However, this is exactly the way two co-workers would go about in any other circumstance. It just so happens that theirs is the repetitive task of running a castle to the point that their presence is invisible, making the Hall seem as though it ran itself.
However the movie is rife with subtext. Hugh Grant has a small part as the apparently clueless Cardinal who is in fact quite aware of his uncle's relation to the Germans and seems to represent an England of the future. He, and Reeve as the American businessman who will eventually succeed in owning Darlington Hall, are vastly different from the traditionalists that Mrs. Kenton, Mr. Stevens, and Lord Darlington are at heart -- even when Mrs. Kenton has a little extra that separates her from the two men, but even she is clamped down by her passivity towards an injustice committed to two German girls (whose final destiny remains unsolved, leading one to believe they may have met a horrible end) which mirrors her inability to truly take control of her life. Where the actual remains of the day would indicate that things would get better, the fact that Mrs. Kenton and Mr. Stevens are unable, maybe even unwilling (at this late point in their life) to truly confess what she had initiated at trying to unveil his inner life through a romance novel, represents the elegant devastation that overwhelms its presence which drowns the movie in regret. Regret for what never even had a chance in the first place even when it had enormous potential, and that makes it the more imploding.
Based on Kazuo Ishiguro's novel of the same name, REMAINS OF THE DAY's plot is deceptively simple: it presents an older Stevens who is on his way to reconnect with an old friend and former co-worker, Mrs. Benn (Emma Thompson), nee Kenton, Darlington Hall's housekeeper. Through a series of vignettes we get to see how it was "in the old days", how Mrs. Kenton came to Darlington Hall, how she and Stevens initially did not get along due to the fact that Stevens' father was a sick man under Stevens' employ and was beginning to falter in his duties as the under-butler. However, as time went by, they would become quite a working team, and through subtle hints both suggest there may be more, however under-developed. We also get to see how Lord Darlington (James Fox), a somewhat pompous man, was progressively revealed to be a Nazi sympathizer and would make some ruining mistakes of his own -- a thing not lost on the American congressman Lewis (Christopher Reeve) who one evening, as a toast to Lord Darlington, calls the European diplomats "amateurs" because they are operating on goodwill and not practicality.
REMAINS OF THE DAY seems to be lacking in plot because in fact, it moves at its own pace much in the style of Merchant-Ivory movies. However, there is quite a bit happening here -- it's just not that evident at first glance. Because at its core, it's a story of people caught in a microcosm of the mundane as veiled, sinister events not to their full understanding are insinuating themselves at the very edges of the frame, there are times when it seems the story dwells too long on mediations of characters tics -- for example, the spat between Mrs. Kenton and Mr. Stevens about Mr. Stevens, Senior's forgetfulness over a Chinaman bobble head, itself a rung on the ladder of Mr. Stevens, Senior's eventual demotion. However, this is exactly the way two co-workers would go about in any other circumstance. It just so happens that theirs is the repetitive task of running a castle to the point that their presence is invisible, making the Hall seem as though it ran itself.
However the movie is rife with subtext. Hugh Grant has a small part as the apparently clueless Cardinal who is in fact quite aware of his uncle's relation to the Germans and seems to represent an England of the future. He, and Reeve as the American businessman who will eventually succeed in owning Darlington Hall, are vastly different from the traditionalists that Mrs. Kenton, Mr. Stevens, and Lord Darlington are at heart -- even when Mrs. Kenton has a little extra that separates her from the two men, but even she is clamped down by her passivity towards an injustice committed to two German girls (whose final destiny remains unsolved, leading one to believe they may have met a horrible end) which mirrors her inability to truly take control of her life. Where the actual remains of the day would indicate that things would get better, the fact that Mrs. Kenton and Mr. Stevens are unable, maybe even unwilling (at this late point in their life) to truly confess what she had initiated at trying to unveil his inner life through a romance novel, represents the elegant devastation that overwhelms its presence which drowns the movie in regret. Regret for what never even had a chance in the first place even when it had enormous potential, and that makes it the more imploding.