Fall films - The Bookshop

Do you know what the goat said after eating a can of film?

"I liked the book better."

I read Penelope Fitzgerald's short novel The Bookshop quite a few years ago. She's one of my favorite writers, in fact, but I had difficulty imagining how her peculiar form of bemused and worldly-wise omniscience would translate to the screen. Spanish director Isabel Coixet didn't try, and perhaps it's just as well. Fitzgerald's novel was about casual cruelty; Coixet's film is about the oppressive atmosphere of small towns and the power of literature to expand people's lives. There are quite a few silly, stagy, and downright unbelievable moments in it, but also some very nice things. I began to like it better the moment I put aside any thought of what the book had been like and said to myself: "This is a fable."

The plot turns on the decision of Florence Green (Emily Mortimer) to open a bookshop in a historic but dilapidated building in a small East Anglia town. As it happens, a local bigwig, one Violet Gamart, has singled out that specific building to house a regional art gallery—though she never got around to buying it, considering it uninhabitable and hence valueless to the general public. The local banker, lawyer, and media "celebrity" all dance to Violet's tune, and many townspeople simply aren't interested in books. Then again, there are several scenes in which the shop appears to be crawling with prospective customers. Suspension of disbelief takes hold early on, and we must refrain from telling ourselves, "She'll be out of business in no time, with or without Violet Gamart's interference."

That Florence is a trusting soul, and perhaps naive, is clear almost from the first. But her awareness extends far beyond the dumbed-down voice-over remarks that intrude occasionally, for example: "Florence had managed to live life thus far by pretending that human beings were not divided into exterminators and exterminating, with the former at any moment predominating." Florence isn't "pretending," of course—she doesn't live in that stark world. She reads. And in the course of the film she also develops a few friendships with people who share her sensibilities—one with the perspicacious little girl who comes to work in her shop, another with a misanthropic gentleman (Bill Nighy) who reads voraciously but rarely ventures beyond his front door.

Among the simple pleasures of this film are watching Florence open big wooden crates and lift stacks of hardbound books out of them, scenes that call to mind choice passages in Walter Benjamin's famous essay, "Unpacking My Library." (I don't remember any scenes during which she actually sells a book.)

Even more fun is watching the mercurial changes in expression that pass across Florence's face as she struggles to deal politely with people who are far more uncomprehending and complacent than she is, though also more self-assured. 

In one scene early in the film a dressmaker is fitting Florence for a dress which we can all see is red. Florence questions the wisdom of wearing a red dress to the afternoon gathering at Violet Gamart's mansion. The woman assures her repeatedly that the dress isn't red, but deep maroon. Florence could have said, "Call it what you will, it isn't right for me. Show me something else." But in the end she prefers not to make waves and gives in to the purchase.

As the local high society dame, Catherine Clarkson, though she appears less often than Mortimer, is no less engaging, with a chilly twinkle in her eye and a facade of graciousness that delicately masks her ruthlessness and cruelty. Bill Nighy is his old crotchety self in a role that's underdeveloped but perhaps couldn't have been otherwise, considering the character's reclusive habits. And the young Honor Kneafsey also adds a lot to the mix as Florence's young assistant--a breath of fresh air every time she appears on screen.

I would like to have seen a longer conversation develop during the scene between Florence and a woman she meets on the beach, the erstwhile girlfriend of a local BBC producer. It might have added a more mature and realistic element to the proceedings. Too often Florence is dealing with children, old men, and moronic, if not malicious, townspeople, and you begin to wonder where she gets the emotional strength—not to mention the cash flow—to continue on.  

I would not be giving anything much away if I reported that the novel on which this film is based ends with the simple lines: "As the train drew out of the station she sat with her head bowed in shame, because the town in which she had lived for nearly ten years had not wanted a bookshop."

That's because in the film version, the story ends differently, and the point it makes is also entirely different.