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Product Description

The glittering yet treacherous world of New York high society comes to brilliant life in the heartbreaking story of Lily Bart (Gillian Anderson, TV's "The X-Files"), a renowned beauty of exquisite charm who seeks a wealthy husband but, in a series of tragic events, winds up disgraced and discarded.Adapted from Edith Wharton's novel, and directed by Terence Davies (Distant Voices, Still Lives), THE HOUSE OF MIRTH is an intelligent, dramatic sensation, which features an outstanding supporting all-star cast including Laura Linney (You Can Count on Me), Eric Stoltz (Pulp Fiction), Dan Aykroyd (Ghostbusters) and Anthony LaPaglia (Sweet and Lowdown).

Product details

Aspect Ratio ‏ : ‎ 2.35:1
Is Discontinued By Manufacturer ‏ : ‎ No
MPAA rating ‏ : ‎ PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Package Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 7.4 x 5.3 x 0.6 inches; 2.4 ounces
Director ‏ : ‎ Terence Davies
Media Format ‏ : ‎ Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
Run time ‏ : ‎ 2 hours and 20 minutes
Release date ‏ : ‎ May 29, 2001
Actors ‏ : ‎ Gillian Anderson, Eric Stoltz, Dan Aykroyd, Anthony LaPaglia, Laura Linney
Dubbed: ‏ : ‎ French
Subtitles: ‏ : ‎ English, French, Spanish
Producers ‏ : ‎ Olivia Stewart
Language ‏ : ‎ Unqualified
Studio ‏ : ‎ Sony Pictures Home Entertainment
ASIN ‏ : ‎ B00003CXSA
Number of discs ‏ : ‎ 1

Best Sellers Rank: #25,921 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
- #997 in Romance (Movies & TV)
- #4,358 in Drama DVDs

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4.3 out of 5

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C. Collins

Social complexity and a heroine who does not learn from mistakes

Reviewed in the United States on November 5, 2008

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When you read the reviews of this film, reviewers who have read the book tend to rate the film lower and indicate that film does not measure up to the novel. However, I think it is only fair to review the film as a stand alone artistic production independent of the source novel, and under this condition the film is superb and highly disturbing. I found myself thinking about the film all the next day after I saw it, for it is dark social commentary on the human condition.

Gillian Anderson plays Lily Bart, a cool socialite, seeking a rich husband among the New York City social upper class. The film follows Lily as she makes one mistake after another in judgment, all with consequences that begin to undermine her social position. Her vulnerability is based on her ambivalence and inaction when action is required. Lily had upper class parents who lost their fortune when she was 19. Now she lives with her Aunt Julia Peniston, and her cousin, Grace Julia Stepney.

The most obvious ambiguity in her life is her love for the handsome lawyer, Lawrence Selden, who does not have the size fortune needed to attract and maintain Lily. She loves him and yet her vocation is to seek a wealthy husband, and Lawrence recognizes that this is her vocation, the goal toward which everyone in her family and social network directs her, and thus he does not push his affections upon her. They become a tragic pair of star-crossed lovers. Eric Stoltz does a great job playing Selden, a cool sophisticated socially accepted handsome man. Under normal circumstance he would be an excellent choice for a husband. However Lily has been bred to go after the highest prize, the wealthiest men in New York City.

Lily has a small inheritance of $9,000 of which she has lost $8,000 in gambling debt which she must repay. She is friends with Gus and Judy Trenor and Judy is attempting to fix Lily up with New York's most wealthy men. But Lily loves Lawrence and she undermines each and every attempt to connect her to a rich husband and secure future. She confides to Gus Trenor that she is in debt and he offers to manage her inheritance. Lily sees Judy and Gus as her great friends and attends the opera with Gus when Judy is in the countryside. Gillian Anderson looks outstanding dressed in red for the Mozart opera but her conspicuous beauty in combination with her married escort begins to stimulate gossip and tales that reach the ears of her prudish rich aunt. Funds come in which Lily disburses, not realizing that these funds are not her dividends but the funds of Gus Trenor who finally reveals he wishes her to become his lover so as to repay the funds he has given her. She refuses Gus but the damage to her reputation has been done.

This incident is minor stuff compared to the incredible double-cross that she endures from Bertha Dorset, who sets up Lily to cover her own marital indiscretion. Lily's cousin Grace uses every opportunity to influence the elderly Aunt Julia and when Julia dies the vast fortune goes to Grace with only enough funds going to Lily to pay her debts.

Lily has the evidence to shame Bertha Dorset and give her husband George Dorset the grounds for a divorce but she does not use the tools she has been given. When the wealthy Jewish businessman Sim Rosedale offers her a strategy by which she can regain her status, she refuses to act, probably because Bertha has had an affair with Lawrence Selden and thus to act would also hurt Lawrence. When rich Aunt Julia dies, she leaves Lily $10,000, enough to cover her debts but no more. Lily never understood or appreciated her aunt's value system and what games would be required to inherit the vast fortune of $400,000 that is left to cousin Grace. Remember that $400,000 in 1907 is equal to about 400 million in 2008 dollars.

The film tracks Lily's sad fall down the social ladder and the poor self destructive decisions that Lily has made come to bring about her downfall. It is an irony that she never really commits any of the indiscretions for which she is accused. Beautiful rich women in her class had to balance their vocation of acquiring wealth with their passion for men other than their husbands. Lily was not cut out for this strategy that Bertha Dorset has mastered so well. Laura Linney is excellent as the relentless Bertha who would sacrifice Lily to cover her own indiscretion.

The end is sad and crushing. Lily has learned that life is difficult and that she is useless person if she no longer resides in the upper crust of wealthy society. She comes to see that she was just a cog in a giant social machine and when she dropped out of the machine, she was of little use to anyone.

23 people found this helpful

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Amazon Customer

Excellent. Moving.

Reviewed in the United States on March 6, 2024

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What a cast! Gillian Anderson · Dan Aykroyd · Eleanor Bron · Anthony LaPaglia · Laura Linney · Elizabeth McGovern.

I couldn’t find this after thoroughly enjoying it years ago. Had to purchase!

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Collin Kelley

Gillian Anderson was robbed of an Oscar nomination

Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2001

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For all of those who believe Gillian Anderson cannot escape the bounds of her Dana Scully character on the X-files, one look at "The House of Mirth" will change that opinion. From the moment she walks out of the cloud of steam created by a train and turns her veiled face to Eric Stoltz, she completely transcends Scully. Anderson plays Lily Bart, who's gambling habit and tendancy to fraternize with men leads to her social downfall in turn of the century New York. She knows she should marry a man with money, but she loves Stoltz's character, Lawrence Seldon, a young attorney who is financially secure but not well off. Through a series of social blunders and failures to understand the motives of several characters, Lily soon finds herself on the outside of society living as a drug addict and making hats. Gillian Anderson plays Lily with such heart-breaking stubborness that most of the time you want to climb through the screen and shake her. But this is a typical Edith Wharton story, and the good guys rarely, if ever, come out on top. Watching Anderson's physical change is one of the most amazing aspects of this film. In the beginning, she is bright and bubbly with a perfect complexion and clear eyes. By the end, her exhaustion and addiction is palpable--her entire body seems to have changed in some way. Here's hoping that more parts like this await Gillian Anderson when she breaks free from X-files.

23 people found this helpful

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D. Shaviro

Three Stars

Reviewed in the United States on January 25, 2018

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The movie is far inferior to the novel, mainly due to the loss of Wharton's authorial voice.

Reviewed in the United States on November 3, 2004

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I had no idea that Gillian Anderson was such a fine actress. Her performance was on the level of a great. I do mean a "great." Gosh it has been a heart wish since the 50's for a "great" to emerge. Meryl Strep has been a contender but that winner is Gillian Anderson.

No one is watching the movie for the movie in my opinion. The movie itself is a little pressed for time and has some disjointed jolts. It is to watch a magnificent performance by Gillian Anderson.

Who could have known that under all that X-Files goofiness was a great? She's a great. I'll go to my grave swearing that. You see it here. A classical great!

5 people found this helpful

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Kenneth M. Head

A "must see!"

Reviewed in the United States on May 29, 2009

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I am a guy, and I must admit that I have difficulty reading books written by a woman. Please, I am not sexist, but I am not familiar with women's descriptions of fabrics, fragrances, and emotions. But I did read, and thoroughly enjoy, Edith Wharton's "House of Mirth." It was a bit complicated so I read it again. THEN I watched the movie on a movie channel. THEN I ordered a DVD. Wharton is a genius so the best way to enjoy the movie is to read the book first! "House of Mirth" is a classic!

8 people found this helpful

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celinette

En bonne état

Reviewed in France on November 21, 2023

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DVD conforme à la description. En bonne état et en Français. Rien à redire

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J. L. Sievert

Silence of love undeclared

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 1, 2017

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Edith Wharton (1862-1937), like Henry James, is a great American author neglected these days, the whims of fashion changing, books and book reading not what they used to be. But in her day Wharton was considered the pre-eminent female novelist in the U.S.

Where does the odd title of the book (and film) come from? It comes from the Bible:

“The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, but the heart of fools is in the house of mirth.”

— Ecclesiastes 7:4

Societies with the capacity to mourn are considered serious, have gravitas, say the Scriptures. Those devoid of it are frivolous and shallow. The world of the heroine of this story (Lily Bart) is not serious. The people in her New York social set, circa 1905, are rich, idle, spoiled, feckless. They are allergic to work, but not to malicious gossip, envy and spite. Money is the measure of everything for them, the more the better, enough never enough. Those with more are superior. Those with less want more as high-class schemers, jockeying with others in high society. Ostentation is not for amusement only; it’s an outward expression of success and a stick with which to beat down interlopers. You would think these rich people would be happy, but no, this isn’t so. Wealth has done nothing to improve their characters. In fact it has made many of them worse. The world described here, vicious and savage, is not a pretty one, its people nasty, callous and mean beneath its mannered surface.

The story is partly moral. How does a person, essentially good and fair-minded (such as Lily), maintain her goodness in the company of spiritually corrupt companions? Not easily, as we shall see. She needs money and position to thrive in society. But she also needs protection, her integrity and sense of self-worth constantly challenged. Add to this love. The thought of marriage without it is intolerable to her. But how to find it in this venal crowd?

Lily’s blush or bloom, as it used to be said of women, is now fading. She’s 29 and still unattached say the whisperers. Women in their child-bearing prime are 25 or younger, and men are acutely aware of this. So without a large fortune of her own Lily deals from a position of weakness.

Lawrence Seldon is a man roughly Lily’s age who has known her for years. They are very friendly, the spark of passion always there but never quite igniting. Why not? Seldon adores Lily but remains reticent, restrained, aloof, distant. Why so? The clearest interpretation is that he feels he can’t provide for her in the manner he thinks she expects. He’s a lawyer, which means he must work, rare for the idle men in her circle. He isn’t independently wealthy. Why should this matter to Lily? Perhaps it doesn’t, but if she feels it matters to him on her account it may contribute to her own reticence, her inability to commit to him. Why their lack of courage? It’s almost as if the social conventions of speaking, of addressing one another, get in the way of telling one another how they truly feel. They can’t communicate, or fear what it would mean if they did. By holding back he grants her the freedom to make a better, more suitable match for herself. For him it’s sacrifice, while for us it looks like cowardice. Maybe it’s both.

On one level Wharton’s writing is satire, her story a comedy of manners and errors. It highlights the absurdity and futility of aristocratic life in America, an imitative copy of a bad European original. But she describes it as tragedy, not comedy, and Terence Davies, the fine lyrical English director of the film, portrays it faithfully as such. Lily’s errors of judgement seem harmless at first. She will not compromise her heart. But a series of mistakes and missteps she makes will accumulate and endanger her.

She’s a beautiful charmer and uses her gifts to dance around men, leading them on. It’s what she’s best at, what she’s been trained to do all her life. It’s not that by toying with them she means to hurt them. She wants to get close but not too close for a closer look. She wants to see as much as she can before committing. She does so again and again with many and concludes she can’t commit.

Percy Gryce is an example. She met him at the Trenor’s estate at Bellomont. He’s an eligible young bachelor with a massive inheritance. He’s looking for a wife and Lily knows it. So she charms him to get closer, to look him over so to speak. Ugh! Boring and unattractive. Wooden, humourless, rigid, pious. No, it’s impossible. The situation reminds one of Jane Austen, aged 27 in 1802, consenting to marry a dull neighbour of hers, he with the preposterous name of Harris Bigg-Wither. She says yes to his proposal after dinner, goes to bed, can’t sleep, breaks off the engagement the following morning, dashing her hopes of ever marrying.

Lily does the right thing for the sake of her heart. She rejects what she knows would be wrong for her, just as Jane Austen did.

There are other temptations too, rich men who offer her money for their selfish purposes. One is Gus Trenor, a married man. Another is Simon Rosedale, a rich property developer. Rosedale proposes to her but she cannot accept. He claims to love her but she thinks he only loves himself. She will not become a decorative ornament to make him shine.

At one point in the novel Lily asks herself:

“Why can one never do a natural thing without screening it behind a structure of artifice?”

It’s a question that can be asked of the entire society she inhabits.

Three things conspire to accelerate Lily’s descent in society.

One is her carelessness with money. She will receive an inheritance of 10,000 dollars when Aunt Julia, her guardian, dies. But she squanders much of it by running up a shopping tab and also by playing bridge at parties (usually losing). She is foolish to think the money-flow tap will remain open indefinitely. She is naïve and gullible.

Second, she trusts Gus Trenor to make good on investing part of her future inheritance. He does not and the loss will be hers, not his.

Third, a horrid socialite named Bertha Dorset engineers a scandal that compromises Lily’s reputation in society. Lily is accused of impropriety with Bertha’s husband George. There’s no truth in this, but suspicion grows, alienating others from Lily.

Add to this her complicated feelings for Lawrence Seldon. Hope in his love is the thing that sustains her as others begin to fall away, abandoning her.

Edith Wharton knew she was writing about insignificant, essentially worthless people. She knew them intimately, having grown up in their world. How could a story about them be made interesting? Her answer was Lily Bart, an emotionally complex woman who refuses to sacrifice her authenticity. Toward the end of her life Wharton wrote the following in her memoirs about The House of Mirth:

“A frivolous society can acquire dramatic significance only through what its frivolity destroys. Its tragic implication lies in its power to debase people and ideals. Once I understood this the tale rushed on toward its climax.”

All eyes in this production are on Lily, which is to say Gillian Anderson. She came to notice doing sci-fi on American TV, her depths largely hidden there. They are not here. Sometimes she needn’t say anything. A glance or expression is enough, her face beautifully reflected by a mirror or window pane. The poetry in this film is largely visual.

At one tender point in the story Lily asks Seldon:

“Why is it whenever we meet we always play this elaborate game?”

She says this with her head resting on his shoulder, her lips still wet from his kiss.

He has no answer, remains silent.

Silence is at the heart of this tragedy, a silence of love undeclared, an act that leads in turn to so many things love will not redeem.

22 people found this helpful

FLORA

la casa della gioia

Reviewed in Italy on July 25, 2013

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FILM DI GRANDE ATTUALITA'.
OTTIMA REGIA,
INTERPRETI MOLTO BRAVI ANCHE SE
ATTORI DI TELEFIM, SORPRENDENTI.
LA TRAMA E LA SCENEGGIATURA , ABBASTANZA
FEDELE AL LIBRO, SUPERBA.
DA VEDERE MA SOPRATTUTTO DA RI-VEDERE.

Kindle-Kunde

Fabelhaft

Reviewed in Germany on June 17, 2005

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Wie alle vorangegangenen Rezensionen, bin ich auch nur voll des Lobes für diesen Film. Die Ausstattung ist nicht nur beeindruckend, sie erscheint auch authentisch und gibt einen überzeugenden Hintergrund für die Geschichte der Lily Bart ab.
Diese Geschichte selbst ist ebenso ansprechend wie tragisch. Lily Bart, die, wie es im Film heisst, immer die "falschen Dinge zur richtigen Zeit" bzw. "vice versa" tut, erleidet ihr Schicksal hin- und hergerissen zwischen den Ansprüchen die ihrem sozialen Status geschuldet sind und moralischem Zögern. So wird sie letztlich durch diesen Konflikt aufgerieben und verliert mehr als ihren sozialen Status.
Etwas überrascht hat mich die Anfangssequenz des Films, in der die Zuschauerin sozusagen mitten ins Geschehen geworfen wird, und in einer einzigen Szene die Beziehung der Charaktere Lily Bart und Lawrence Seldon erahnen muss. Interessanterweise gelingt das hervorragend, und durch die Interaktion dieser beiden gewinnt man Einblicke nicht nur in eine möglicherweise romantische Liebesgeschichte, sondern auch in die komplexe Figur der Lily Bart.
Hervorzugeben ist meiner Meinung nach nicht nur die wirklich beachtliche Leistung Gillian Andersons, die in historischem Gewand schön wie ein Gemälde ist, sondern auch Eric Stoltz als Seldon. Er spielt diesen ebenfalls in sozialem Statusdenken verharrenden Charakter mit großem Charme und bezwingendem Understatement. Durch hervorragendes Casting und zwei wirklich talentierte Schauspieler entsteht eine Chemie, welche andere Edith Wharton Verfilmungen zwischen ihren Akteuren vermissen lassen.
Ebenfalls lobend zu erwähnen sind Laura Linney und Dan Akroyd, welche die weniger konfliktgetriebenen als -treibenden Charaktere in diesem Drama spielen. Sehr überzeugend!
Alles in allem ein fabelhafter Film, der nur zu empfehlen ist.

12 people found this helpful

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W. A. D.

A disappointment!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 26, 2021

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I’ve just watched “The House of Mirth” for the first time. It’s adapted from a fabulous novel but a slow, confused and weakly directed film with cliched music and a clunky script in which Wharton’s epigrams are not well integrated but punctuate the dialogue like sore thumbs - or sub Henry James. Judging by the Amazon reviews I’m in the minority over this! Still, the cast are solid, the design and production values are fantastic - it’s such a shame about the film though. It’s production budget was $10 million but its only recouped a half of this at the Box Office.

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Genre	Romance
Format	Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Dubbed, DVD, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC
Contributor	Laura Linney, Anthony LaPaglia, Olivia Stewart, Eric Stoltz, Gillian Anderson, Elizabeth McGovern, Dan Aykroyd, Terence Davies, Film4; Glasgow Film Fund; Granada Film Limited; Scottish Arts Council; Showtime Networks Inc.; Three See more
Language	English
Runtime	2 hours and 20 minutes