Lolita vs. Lolita

"2.75 stars out of 4"

So I got to see Kubrick's Lolita a few weeks back. I had seen Adrian Lyne's version several years ago. I just looked up to see his past career and noticed that without realizing it, I had seen many of his movies before. He is the man behind "Fatal Attraction", "Indecent Proposal" and more recently "Unfaithful" (hmmm...I can see a theme here).

When I saw Lyne's version, I remember at the beginning of movie he had a commentary where he was asking the audience to disregard the negative criticism on his "Lolita" and watch it with an open mind. I think the negative feedback he had gotten were from diehard fans of Kubrick and also because of pedophiliac imagery in his movie. I am so glad I did listen to him and had the privilege of not having seen Kubrick's at the time.

A few differences caught my attention that I thought I could share.

The first thing that catches your attention is the acting. I mean what movie would be boring with the mere presence of Peter Sellers in it?! He was a blast and I think Kubrick had him in his movies just for the sake of his own fun. Not that I want to dis his talent, because needless to say he was talented indeed. And the other notable acting in this movie was that of Shelley Winters'. Compared to Melanie Griffith, she did a better job of depicting a desperate widow. I can't believe that she wasn't even nominated for an Oscar. Probably because the Academy didn't approve of the movie's storyline back in the day. However, one advantage that the new Lolita had, in my opinion, was having Jeremy Irons as the main character. Maybe not many people would see the difference, but I don't know...I would add him and his deep melancholic voice to any movie!

The second difference is the theme. Kubrick's had a much more comic tone to it than Lyne's. Actually, I don't think Lyne's had any comic tone at all and I consider it a good thing because in Kubrick's you would get distracted from the main point and what was going on, to the point when the comedy stopped, you would get bored. I liked the gloomy theme that Lyne had added to his film and I think Nabokov would've approved as well.

And lastly, I found the main problem through a comment that my friend made after we left the theater. She turned to me and said, "was this movie made by the same guy who made 2001?! What was the point? They hadn't done a good job of covering who the school psychiatrist was (who was Sellers)." I said, "well, they wanted you to know who he was from the starts".  -"So what was the point?!"

You see, in Lyne's version, the identity of the guy who Lolita is seeing is kept a secret until the very end but in Kubrick's version, from the very start we know who he is and in fact, that's where the story begins!

I don't know why Kubrick decided to do it this way. It deprived his movie from the suspense. Actually, after Shelley Winters' character got killed off, not only the tempo of the movie fell dramatically, but you also had nothing to look forward to (which was the wit!). Whereas in Lyne's, you are hooked until the very end.

So I leave you with this: watch both. You will enjoy the storytelling and the sincerity of the newer version BUT you will definitely enjoy the acting you will find in the original version. I would recommend seeing the new version first, if you haven't already done so. Because although I spoiled it, but like I said earlier, I have the feeling that that's how Nabokov had intended it to be received and also the storytelling is much better. After you have found out about the story, then you can take a peek at what inserting Sellers in there (forcibly) would make it look like.

P.S.: The rating looks a bit weird. I first gave it 2.5 stars but then I remembered the laughs I had in the theater and I thought that deserves another 0.25 points! But to be fair to all the movies that I have rated 3, I wanted to keep it under 3. And to be fair to Kubrick, compared to the movies I have given 2 stars to, I had to keep it above 2.5 the least!