In what is clearly a labor of love, Rupert Everett has delved deep into the character and cultural product that was Oscar Wilde. He fully attempts to embody his hero through acting; he channels absolute creative power, moreover, as writer and director. The film's central metaphor -- that of the eponymous story Wilde would tell children -- is voiced-over in sporadic intervals that creates amazing dramatic tension against the story we see. And while The Happy Prince works hard to educate and celebrate, it is almost never happy and only occasionally made me happy.
To be fair, it's not meant to. Wilde's biting wit and savage sensibilities have been the subject of countless works; this story, however, dramatizes the much-less-known time after his trial and imprisonment with hard labor. In fact, the film is almost exclusively concerned with his aging, his trauma, his despair, and his death. Obese, alcoholic, and weak, he stumbles his way across the screen and through the film, slurring words with a voice that was, surely, once beatific. He's selfish and pitiful, wallowing in misery and poverty while wasting away on gluttonous sin. And, true enough to the time and artist, he preys upon the youthful. I found Everett's representation of what amounts to abuse disturbing -- especially in light of current social movements -- and the pedophilia was not contextualized in the slightest, leaving even someone who knows plenty about Wilde's life confused as to the message being delivered in this film.
Everett views the story, thankfully, not as a straightforward biopic but rather as an expressionistic exhibition of Wilde's state of being. The camera pays close attention to color and light, texture and warmth, and we are left with a clear sensation of a man decaying within his own mind. We are forced to hear endless voiceovers, mostly narrated from snippets of Wilde's story that clash royally with what's happening narratively. It all becomes a dreamlike prison, a maze of audio and visual cues we follow for two good reasons: One, we aren't sure what the purpose is, and two, it's clear the aesthetic is so strictly controlled we don't want to impose ourselves upon it.
This latter point is why, in my opinion, the movie ultimately fails. In depicting so much suffering and failure, the film would have done well to engage the audience, letting Wilde get under our skin and into our hearts. Then again, that might not be faithful to the real Wilde. But the film instead alienates us from him even as it forces us into his headspace. He's totally unlikable but we still manage to feel everything he's going through. It becomes a sort of out-of-body experience, and it took all I could to stay alert, trying to piece together the film before me. Only too clear were Everett's efforts; if only he made his final product as accessible to us as it is for him.
I'm left with a conundrum. Am I impressed with Everett's performance but not his screenplay? Am I impressed with his direction but not his performance? For every compliment I can afford him, I find at least two complaints, but in different aspects. Let us leave it thus: It's a weird movie that deserves a place on the Wilde shelf but certainly not as an end-piece. And it certainly won't make anyone very happy.
IMDb: The Happy Prince
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