Plot
In the 1870s, New York City is dominated by a community of old-money WASP families whose lives are guided by strict codes of conduct. The elite police their own through ostracism, or worse.
Gentleman lawyer Newland Archer is planning a society marriage to May Welland. May's cousin, Countess Ellen Olenska, returns to New York after a disastrous marriage to a Polish aristocrat. When the count cheated on Ellen, Ellen retaliated by sleeping with her secretary. Because of high society's double standards, Ellen's conduct is considered particularly scandalous. As a result, she is initially ostracized. Archer is indignant at the unfair treatment and helps Ellen's family restore Ellen's place in the community.
Ellen meets financier Julius Beaufort, who entered New York society by marrying into the Townsend family. His status ensures he is treated courteously, but his philandering makes him widely disliked. He begins flirting with Ellen, but meets his (social) end when the New York elite—sick of his indiscretions—refuses to bail him out during a financial panic.
Archer asks May to marry him. Although May senses he is not ready, she accepts. May's intuition proves to be correct. Archer is drawn to Ellen's unconventional views on New York society, which contrast with May's seeming passivity, lack of personality, and fondness for idle leisure.
Ellen attempts to divorce the count, who retaliates by threatening to publicize her adultery. Because an adultery accusation would humiliate the entire Welland family, the community urges Archer to intercede. Archer sympathizes with Ellen, but does his duty, and pressures Ellen to call off the divorce.
Archer realizes that he has fallen in love with Ellen, and tries to resolve the issue by urging May to rush into the wedding. Suspicious, May asks him once again if his love is genuine. Archer reassures her that it is.
Nonetheless, Archer cannot help confessing his love to Ellen. Although she loves him back, she declines his advances. She bitterly explains that she was ready to endure the scandal of a divorce, but Archer and May were not. To avoid further temptation, she moves to Washington. May advances the wedding date and the wedding goes off without a hitch; Ellen declines her invitation.
Archer's marriage is comfortable, but boring. He eventually arranges to meet Ellen in secret. They admit they still love each other.
The count offers Ellen money and even some personal freedom to renew her wedding vows. Ellen's family pressures her to take the deal by cutting her personal allowance. However, Ellen declines the offer. Archer and Ellen continue meeting in secret, but Archer's elaborate deceptions arouse May's suspicions. Archer and Ellen decide to make love, but before they can do so, Ellen abruptly announces that she is returning to Europe, aided by a generous allowance from Archer's mentor, Mrs. Mingott.
May throws a lavish farewell party for Ellen. Following the party, May tells Archer that she is pregnant. She admits that she shared the news with Ellen before confirming the pregnancy. Archer realizes that he has gravely underestimated May, who suspected his emotional affair all along. He also realizes that Ellen left America because she could not bring herself to sleep with a married father, and that the entire community has been working behind the scenes to separate him from Ellen.
A quarter-century passes, during which Archer and May raise three children. May dies of pneumonia, leaving Archer a widower. Ironically, high society's unwritten rules have faded away, and Archer's son Ted is engaged to the daughter of Beaufort's mistress.
Ted invites Archer to a father-son holiday in Paris. He reveals that he planned the trip so that Archer could meet Ellen again, explaining on her deathbed, May confessed that "when she asked you to, you gave up the thing you wanted most." Archer replies, "She never asked me."
Archer and Ted walk to Ellen's apartment together, but Archer cannot bring himself to visit her, and sends Ted in his place. He reflects on their time together and walks away.
Production
The Moorish Room, staged as a dining room
The mansion's dining room staged as a bedroom
The Age of Innocence was filmed on location primarily in Troy, New York. [7] [8] [9] The opera scenes were filmed at the Philadelphia Academy of Music in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The scenes set in the home of Mrs. Mingott were filmed in "The Castle", a fraternity house belonging to the Alpha Tau chapter of Pi Kappa Phi at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Formerly known as the Paine Mansion, after its completion in 1896 (then-estimated to cost $500,000), it was heralded as the grandest house in all of Troy. [10] [11] The scenes depicting the country house in snow were filmed inside the circa 1737 Dutch-colonial Luykas Van Alen House, in Kinderhook, New York. [7] Only one major set was built, for an ornate ballroom sequence at the Beaufort residence. [12] The triangular Victorian Gothic Rice Building was used as the setting for the law office. [13]
Director Jamie Babbit began her career as an intern for Scorsese on the film. [14]
Writing
Scorsese's friend and screenwriter Jay Cocks gave him the Wharton novel in 1980, suggesting that this should be the romantic piece Scorsese should film, as Cocks felt it best represented his sensibility. In Scorsese on Scorsese he noted that
Although the film deals with New York aristocracy and a period of New York history that has been neglected, and although it deals with code and ritual, and with love that's not unrequited but unconsummated—which pretty much covers all the themes I usually deal with—when I read the book, I didn't say, "Oh good, all those themes are here." [15]
Graphic design and titles
The film's title sequence was created by Elaine and Saul Bass. Bass, himself, noted that the titles were highly ambiguous and metaphoric, and the result of his fascination with time-lapse photography. The sequences' visual symphony of blooming roses and lace were to convey the submerged sensuality and hidden codes of the era. [16] The famous paintings featured in the film were newly created high-quality reproductions. [17] The bursts of color employed as a fade out were inspired by the films Black Narcissus (1947), by Michael Powell, and Rear Window (1954), by Alfred Hitchcock. [18]
Reception
Box office
The film grossed $32.3 million in the United States and Canada and $68 million worldwide from a $34 million budget. [1] [2]
Critical response
On review-aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 88% based on 65 reviews, and an average rating of 7.50/10. The site's consensus states: "Equal measures romantic and wistful, Martin Scorsese's elegant adaptation of The Age of Innocence is a triumphant exercise in both stylistic and thematic restraint." [19] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 90 out of 100, based on 35 critics, indicating "universal acclaim". [20] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on an A+ to F scale. [21]
The Age of Innocence placed as the fourth best film of 1993 in a poll of 107 film critics, as it was named on over 50 lists. [22]
In The New York Times , Vincent Canby said, "Taking The Age of Innocence, Edith Wharton's sad and elegantly funny novel about New York's highest society in the 1870s, Martin Scorsese has made a gorgeously uncharacteristic Scorsese film...The film is the work of one of America's handful of master craftsmen." [23] Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times wrote, "The story told here is brutal and bloody, the story of a man's passion crushed, his heart defeated. Yet it is also much more, and the last scene of the film, which pulls everything together, is almost unbearably poignant." [24] He then added the film to his "Great Movies" collection, and defined the film as "one of Scorsese's greatest". [25]
Peter Travers of Rolling Stone wrote, "A superlative cast catches Wharton's urgency. Ryder, at her loveliest, finds the guile in the girlish May – she'll use any ruse that will help her hold on to Archer. Day-Lewis is smashing as the man caught between his emotions and the social ethic. Not since Olivier in Wuthering Heights has an actor matched piercing intelligence with such imposing good looks and physical grace. Pfeiffer gives the performance of a lifetime as the outcast countess." [26]
Desson Howe of The Washington Post wrote, "There's an alert, thinking presence behind the camera. And, in front of the camera, performers Daniel Day-Lewis, Michelle Pfeiffer and Winona Ryder suffuse this saga of repressed longing and spiritual suffering with elegant authority.... Known primarily for modern street pictures, such as Taxi Driver and GoodFellas , Scorsese shows he can flex an entirely different set of muscles and still make a great movie." [27]
Todd McCarthy of Variety said, "For sophisticated viewers with a taste for literary adaptations and visits to the past, there is a great deal here to savor....Day-Lewis cuts an impressive figure as Newland... The two principal female roles are superbly filled.... Scorsese brings great energy to what could have been a very static story, although his style is more restrained and less elaborate than usual." [28]
Rita Kempley, also of The Washington Post, wrote, "Perhaps it shouldn't come as such a grand surprise that he [Martin Scorsese] is as deft at exploring the nuances of Edwardian manners as he is the laws of modern-day machismo." [29] Time Out said, "The performances are excellent, while the director employs all the tools of his trade to bring his characters and situations vividly to life... Scorsese's most poignantly moving film." [30]
In contrast to the positive reviews, Marc Savlov in the Austin Chronicle wrote, "At two hours and 13 minutes, Scorsese has allowed himself enough time to follow Wharton's book to the letter, and also enough time to include long stretches of painfully wearisome society functions and banter. As a period piece, it's a joy to behold, but with such an indecisive little newt of a protagonist, it's just hard to give a damn what happens." [31]
Accolades
At the Academy Awards, The Age of Innocence won the Academy Award for Best Costume Design (Gabriella Pescucci), and was nominated for the awards for Best Supporting Actress (Winona Ryder), Best Adapted Screenplay (Jay Cocks, Martin Scorsese), Best Original Score (Elmer Bernstein) and Best Art Direction (Dante Ferretti, Robert J. Franco). [3]
At the Golden Globe Awards, The Age of Innocence won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress - Motion Picture (Winona Ryder), and was nominated for the awards for Best Motion Picture – Drama, Best Director – Motion Picture (Martin Scorsese) and Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama (Michelle Pfeiffer). [32]
At the British Academy Film Awards (BAFTAs), The Age of Innocence won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Miriam Margolyes). [33] The film received another nomination in this category, for Winona Ryder, and was also nominated for the awards for Best Cinematography (Michael Ballhaus) and Best Production Design (Dante Ferretti).
In addition to her Academy Award and BAFTA Award nominations and Golden Globe Award win, Winona Ryder won the National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress [34] and the Southeastern Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress. [35]
In addition to his Academy Award and Golden Globe Award nominations, Martin Scorsese won the National Board of Review Award for Best Director [34] and the Elvira Notari Prize at the Venice Film Festival (shared with Michelle Pfeiffer), [36] as well as a nomination for the Directors Guild of America Award for Outstanding Directing - Feature Film. [37]
Elmer Bernstein was nominated for the Grammy Award for Best Instrumental Composition Written for a Motion Picture or Television. [38]
