The Hours Movie Review

“I am living a life I have no wish to live…how did this happen?” (Virginia Woolf, played by Nicole Kidman, in The Hours Motion Picture). In the 2002 Academy Award winning movie, The Hours, the final years of prominent twentieth century author, Virginia Woolf, are captured. In particular, the workings of her masterpiece book, Mrs. Dalloway, are depicted and creatively intertwine with the lives of two other women in the film. The director, Stephen Daldry, and producers, Scott Rudin and Robert Fox, based this movie on the Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Michael Cunningham. Through this story we witness the lives of three separate, but similar women living in different eras. Each faces complexities from within that they ultimately struggle to solve in their individual way. In general, The Hours is a powerful film that portrays the expected role of women in society, while also illustrating the desire and need for some women to break away from the believed cultural norms.
The movie tracks three women through a day in their lives. The first story focuses on Virginia Woolf in England in1923 as she begins to write her novel, Mrs. Dalloway. The second narrative follows Laura Brown, a Californian housewife who is reading Mrs. Dalloway in 1951. The third account details the life of Clarissa Vaughn in 2001 as she basically lives the life of Mrs. Dalloway from Virginia Woolf’s novel in New York City. Throughout the film, clips of these three women’s days alternate back and forth.
The character of Virginia Woolf, played by Nicole Kidman, is an extremely gifted writer who is fighting depression, while writing one of her final novels, Mrs. Dalloway, in the 1920s. She is living under doctor supervision in Richmond, England, a suburb of London, due to her two previous attempts to commit suicide. Her husband, Leonard Woolf, and her family constantly worry and look out for her well being. As the day unfolds, Virginia’s writing is well underway when she receives a visit from her sister, Vanessa Bell, and her sister’s three children. During this time, Virginia contemplates the events in her book and determines that a character in the novel must die. Also, the audience begins to recognize the close relationship she shares with Vanessa and even witnesses a passionate kiss between them. Moments afterwards Virginia asks her sister, “Do you think I may one day escape?” This question exposes her intricate feelings of confinement and inability to live her life freely. In the end, Virginia successfully commits suicide by drowning herself in a nearby river. She leaves a heartfelt letter for her husband that explains the agony she continually felt and thanks him for his unfaltering goodness.
Julianne Moore plays the role of Laura Brown, a wife and mother who is expecting her second child in California post World War II. As her day sets out, the film shows her inability to get out of bed and face the world on her husband’s birthday. She seems totally disconnected from her life and deeply interested in Virginia Woolf’s book, Mrs. Dalloway. When she finally gets out of bed she sees her husband, Dan Brown, off to work and plans to bake a cake with her son, Richard Brown, for her husband’s birthday. After failing at her first attempt, she proceeds to bake a second cake. Then, her friend Kitty stops by and together they share an intimate moment. It is in that scene where Laura realizes that she is not the women her family and friends think she is. She wonders why her war hero husband made the mistake of choosing her, a shy lonely girl who loved to read in high school, when he could have had any girl he wished. Following these negative inner thoughts, she drops her son at her friend’s home and checks into a hotel where she reads Mrs. Dalloway and plans to kill herself. Although she does not go through with it, she ultimately abandons her family after she gives birth to her daughter. Later on in the movie when she describes that segment of her life she movingly exclaims that, “it was death, I chose life.”
The character of Clarissa Vaughn, played by Meryl Streep, is a modern day lesbian editor who is deeply devoted to caring for Richard, her friend and past lover who is dying of AIDS. Throughout her day she is preparing a party that she is hosting to honor Richard for winning a poetry prize for his life’s work. When Clarissa first visits his apartment in the morning, the audience takes notice that Richard calls her Mrs. Dalloway. He plainly says, “Oh Mrs. Dalloway…always giving parties to cover the silence.” This statement along with the events occurring through the day, expose Clarissa’s feelings of confliction. She questions her life decisions including her life with Sally, her lover for ten years, and she wonders what her life may have been like if she were still with Richard. In one of the final scenes, the party is cancelled when Richard unexpectedly commits suicide by jumping out of the window of his apartment. It seemed as though he felt burdensome to Clarissa; he wanted her to focus on her own life without having to constantly care for him. In the conclusion, both Clarissa and Mrs. Dalloway finally overcome their emotions and take comfort in the idea that life does have meaning.
During this movie, several powerful themes emerge. One in particular focuses on the constraint of societal roles on each of the woman. They seem to wrestle with the cultural expectations placed on them solely because of their gender and they also tend to sacrifice their individual identities to make others happy. Although all three women faced these similar challenges, they dealt with them differently depending on the time period in which they lived. Virginia Woolf was not considered the typical English wife. Her inabilities to take control of her own life along with her lesbian tendencies drove her to commit suicide. Conversely, Laura Brown was living the American dream in suburban California with a loving family, beautiful home, and nice car. However, this perfect life was all just a lie to her. It was not at all what Laura had wanted, but during that time in history she, like Virginia, was unable to voice her opinion and speak out about her desperation. So Laura dealt with it by fleeing. On the other hand, Clarissa Vaughn was living in modern day as a domestic lesbian woman. Her role as a homosexual in society was more accepted, yet she was still conflicted. The audience caught her wondering whether or not she was in love with Richard, Sally, or both. In other words, Clarissa still seemed to question her sexuality and life right up until she got closure when Richard died and she began to better understand and love herself, her life, and her hours.
As a prospective adolescent teacher, I recognize that the The Hours movie carries various implications for society and more specifically for education. All students in a classroom, male or female and homosexual, heterosexual, or bisexual, are protected under Title IX of the 1972 Education Amendments (Gollnick & Chinn, 2009). Teachers are supposed to provide a nonsexist education that does not discriminate or stereotype any student based on his/her gender or sexual orientation. Accepting all learners for who they are, not casting societal judgments on them, and supporting their development in all aspects including their identity is greatly important. Further, teachers must also react appropriately if students are disrespecting each other in any way. Overall, educators, students and society in general should become aware of the constraints they tend to place on individuals in differing cultural groups. Through The Hours movie, one sees just how suffocating and overpowering these pressures can be on the twisted lives of three human beings in the twentieth century.



References

Gollnick, D. M. &Chinn, P.C. (2009). Multicultural Education in a Pluralistic Society (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.

Rudin, S. & Fox, R. (Producers), & Daldry, S. (Director). (2002). The hours [Motion Picture]. United States: Paramount Pictures and Miramax Films.