Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events
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| Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events | |
|---|---|
 International poster |
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| Directed by | Brad Silberling |
| Produced by | Laurie MacDonald Walter F. Parkes |
| Written by | Lemony Snicket (books) Robert Gordon (screenplay) |
| Narrated by | Jude Law |
| Starring | Emily Browning Liam Aiken Jim Carrey Kara and Shelby Hoffman Jude Law Timothy Spall |
| Music by | Thomas Newman |
| Cinematography | Emmanuel Lubezki |
| Editing by | Michael Kahn |
| Distributed by | Paramount Pictures (US) DreamWorks (worldwide) |
| Release date(s) | December 17, 2004 |
| Running time | 107 minutes |
| Country |  USA |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $125,000,000 US (est.) |
| Official website | |
| Allmovie profile | |
| IMDb profile | |
Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events is a 2004 film, directed by Brad Silberling. It is based on the first three novels, The Bad Beginning, The Reptile Room, and The Wide Window, in Lemony Snicket's book series. It was nominated for four Academy Awards, and won one for Best Makeup. The movie stars Emily Browning as Violet Baudelaire "the Inventor", Liam Aiken as Klaus Baudelaire "the Scholar", and Kara and Shelby Hoffman as Sunny Baudelaire "the Biter". The movie also stars Jim Carrey as the evil and dreadful Count Olaf.
As in the books, exactly where and when the story takes place is unclear. The film reflects this ambiguity in its anachronistic art direction; it was praised for its creative sets and costumes, all of which have a darkly expressionistic and gothic feel, leading to a highly unusual and creative visual motif.[1][2] Silberling has said this was partly inspired by the visual style of the similarly themed The Night of the Hunter.
Contents |
[edit] Taglines
- Mishaps. Mayhem. Misadventures. Oh joy.
- We're very concerned.
- Don't Say We Didn't Warn You
[edit] Plot
The film is narrated by Lemony Snicket (Jude Law), who occasionally appears in silhouette, writing the story on a typewriter in what appears to be the interior of a clock tower. Inventive Violet Baudelaire (Emily Browning), her intelligent younger brother Klaus (Liam Aiken), and their sharp-toothed, precocious baby sister Sunny (Kara and Shelby Hoffman) are orphaned when a mysterious fire destroys their parents' mansion. They are placed in the care of bank manager Mr. Poe (Timothy Spall), who entrusts them to their "closest relative". However, misinterpreting the phrase, Mr. Poe chooses the relative who lives the shortest distance away, the obnoxious Count Olaf (Jim Carrey). Olaf promises to take care of the orphans "as if they were actually wanted" but in fact is only interested in the huge fortune that Violet will inherit when she turns the age of 18. In the meantime, he treats them like slaves.
Eventually, after a failed attempt by Count Olaf to murder them by locking them in a car parked on railroad tracks, on which a train is travelling, Mr. Poe (who believes that Olaf's mistake was in allowing Sunny to drive the car) sends the children to live with their uncle, Dr. Montgomery Montgomery (Billy Connolly), a cheerfully eccentric herpetologist having a well-stocked reptile room full of bizarre, imaginary reptiles, who is planning a trip to Peru. Their stay with "Monty" is cut short when Olaf turns up in disguise, pretending to be a sharply dressed man named Stephano, a replacement for Monty's assistant Gustav. It is later determined that Gustav was murdered by Olaf so he could take his place. The Baudelaires see through the disguise instantly; they manage to convince Monty that Olaf is an impostor, but fail to impress the villain's true intention on him — Monty being convinced that the supposed Stephano is a rival herpetologist come to plagiarize Monty's recent scientific discoveries. Olaf later murders Monty and frames a tame viper for the killing. The children manage to convince a skeptical Mr. Poe and a Constable about Olaf's guilt, though not of his identity; at this, the count discards his disguise and escapes. The Baudelaires are forced to move again, this time to the shores of Lake Lachrymose, where their Aunt, Josephine Anwhistle (Meryl Streep), resides. She seems to have an irrational fear of numerous unlikely events, and yet lives in a house precariously perched over the edge of a cliff. The house is held up by stilts and includes a wide window overlooking the lake. It appears to contain clues to the cause of the fire that killed their parents; Josephine, too, appears to know more than she is willing to reveal. Before the children can discover more, however, Olaf turns up again, disguised as a sailor, and courts Josephine.
The orphans soon discover that Josephine has disappeared and the window has been smashed, leading the Baudelaires to believe that she has committed suicide. She leaves what looks like a suicide note, but which is actually a coded message telling them that she is hiding in Curdled Cave on the shore of the lake. Before they can follow, the house is torn apart by a hurricane, wherein three of Josephine's phobiae are realized. The Baudelaires escape, eventually find Josephine, and attempt to take her to safety. Count Olaf finds them first, taking the Baudelaires and leaving Josephine at the mercy of the water and of the deadly Lachrymose Leeches. Mr. Poe turns up and gives Olaf custody of the orphans, because he is led to believe that Olaf saved Klaus from the leeches.
At Olaf's home, he concocts a scheme that involves staging a play starring himself and Violet. In the play, his character will marry Violet's character, but in such a way that the marriage will actually be legal, giving him access to her money. This move is accomplished by the fact that Olaf has a local official, Justice Strauss (Catherine O'Hara), cast as a judge in the play; with her in this role, he could make the marriage legal. To ensure Violet's co-operation, he holds Sunny hostage. While the play is being performed, Klaus attempts to rescue Sunny. In doing so, he discovers a gigantic, eye-shaped magnifying glass attached by six rods protruding from a round window. This looks similar to a drawing found in Aunt Josephine's house and is suggested to have been the cause of the fire that orphaned Klaus and his sisters.
After Violet signs the marriage certificate, she reveals the scheme to the audience. Olaf gloats to everyone, pointing out that every time the Baudelaires tried to tell the adults the truth, they were not believed. Olaf's plan is thwarted at the last minute when Klaus uses the magnifying glass to burn the marriage certificate. Snicket jokingly tells us that Count Olaf is sentenced to suffer everything the Baudelaires experienced (the falling house, the leeches, the car on the train tracks) and then spend his life behind bars. However, Snicket immediately adds that Olaf and his cohorts (who are shown briefly in some scenes) escaped.
Later, Mr. Poe makes one last stop in the ruins of the Baudelaires' home. There the orphans find the letter left to them by their parents, informing them of how much they were loved and that there is in fact, more good in the world than bad. The envelope also contains a spyglass; one of several that appear, throughout the film, to imply the presence of a secret society to which the protagonists' parents belonged.
The film ends with Snicket finishing the story by saying that "there are people in the world who know no misery and woe and they take comfort in cheerful films about twittering birds and giggling elves. There are people who know that there's always a mystery to be solved and they take comfort in researching and writing down any important evidence" and then reminds the audience that "this story is not about such people, but about the Baudelaires, who are the sort of people who know that there's always something to invent, read, bite, and something to do to make a sanctuary, no matter how small". The reference to "twittering birds and giggling elves" is a reference to the prologue of the film, which makes that which seems to be a deliberate attempt to disappoint the viewers by pretending to show a movie about the same, then shifting to the main story.
Many references to this suggested movie, The Littlest Elf, are made throughout the film. There is a bobblehead doll of the elf in Count Olaf's car. When the train is arriving and the Baudelaires frantically press all the buttons on the car, Violet accidentally turns on the radio, and the Littlest Elf's theme music starts playing from it. The same music is heard while the orphans are going to Lake Lachrymose. When in the boat, Count Olaf mocks the children for suggesting that they will have a happy ending, saying "and everyone will be singing and dancing and giggling like the Littlest Elf.
The last shot is of the Baudelaires en route to their new guardians (who are probably Sir and Charles of The Miserable Mill), and Snicket quoting the final line to The Wide Window, which states that the Baudelaires were "very fortunate, indeed". The credits roll, against a backdrop resembling illustrations composed of cut-paper dolls and silhouettes. This scenery depicts the children running away from Count Olaf, only to have him catch up with them.
[edit] Cast
[edit] Comparison with the books
Like the original books, the movie contains various clues to the mystery of the Baudelaire parents' deaths. For instance, the children discover that all of their relatives seemed to own spyglasses, and acquire one themselves at the end. Count Olaf has an eye-shaped tattoo on his ankle, and Aunt Josephine's wide window is also eye-shaped. The initials "V.F.D." can also be spotted near the beginning of the film, although in the books the orphans first see them in The Austere Academy.
There are quite a few differences between the books and the film. Many of these involve some dark content being toned down, although some are related to time restrictions common to most book-to-movie conversions. The biggest example of this is the ending of The Wide Window. In the book, the wedding takes place near the end of the first book. In the film, the wedding takes place at the end of the storyline of the third book. According to the DVD commentary, this was changed to give the film a better climactic ending. However, in the book, the wedding was one of the main reasons for the children to be taken away from Count Olaf. Therefore a small scene was added in the movie in which Olaf tries to kill the Baudelaires by stopping his car on the rail track at the Last Chance General Store gas station, locking them inside, and waiting for the train to come. Mr. Poe arrives later and takes the orphans away from Olaf's care.
In the film, Olaf leaves Aunt Josephine alone to fend for herself on a sinking boat. The book's ending, however, is far more sinister: Olaf pushes Josephine into the water, and the torn remnants of her lifejacket are later discovered, although this version can be seen in an unfinished deleted scene. In the book, Violet builds a refraction device to signal for help. In the movie, however, she and Klaus call for help and wave their arms.
Another change from the books is that Count Olaf is shown to be responsible for starting the fire at the Baudelaire mansion by pointing a giant, eye-shaped magnifying glass at the house. The only novel that has any proof for this was The Slippery Slope, when Quigley tells Carmelita that Count Olaf will probably burn down their houses, and Klaus claims to have the proof for it. Olaf is a known arsonist, and the Baudelaires secretly believed him to be responsible for the cause of all their trouble; when he was finally confronted, Olaf denied it, telling them that they knew nothing.
The eye tattoo that Count Olaf sports on his ankle is considerably different from the one described in the book and drawn by Lemony Snicket in his fictional autobiography. The tattoo in the books is formed out of the letters V, F, and D; but it is impossible to form these letters from the tattoo in the movie. However, Brett Helquist's illustrations of Olaf's ankle in the books are the same as the tattoo depicted in the film.
In the book The Reptile Room Count Olaf is disguised by wearing a long coat and having a false beard, whereas in the film, Count Olaf wears a yellow suit, glasses, and has a false moustache.
In the book, Violet climbs the tower to save Sunny, the[night before Olaf's play. In the film, Klaus is the one who climbs, Violet being in the play. In the film, Olaf recognizes Violet writing with her lefthand and tells her to use her right hand. In the book, Olaf did not see her write with her left, voiding the marriage.
The original ending for The Reptile Room section in the book was a scene of Sunny biting the Hook-Handed Man's fake, disguised hands. In the movie, she played with the Incredibly Deadly Viper to prove he did that he kill Uncle Monty In the book, the scene wherein they must cook dinner is very different from the film. In the book, the orphans search for a cookbook. In the film, they search for something to cook, not finding anything edible until looking in a cupboard where are many pieces of stale pasta. The children do not visit Justice Strauss' home in the film.
[edit] Reception
It was released on December 17, 2004 in theaters. The film was a low box office result at the box office during the 2004 holiday season, eventually earning over $100 million in North America against its $140 million budget. It failed to domestically beat its own budget because it earned only $118, 643, 549. It earned a worldwide total of $209,073,645 and didn't double its budget on gross revenue.
However, the movie garnered a mostly positive reaction from critics, earning a 71% score at rottentomatoes.com.[3] Most negative criticism concerned Jim Carrey's portrayal of Count Olaf, claiming that he made the villain more interesting than the heroes. However, much praise was put on the child actors, especially Australian actress Emily Browning; Jim Carrey said, "Emily is just going to break a million hearts". Billy Connolly and Meryl Streep also received praise for their portrayals of Dr. Montgomery Montgomery and Aunt Josephine, respectively. The movie was also critically acclaimed for its artwork, for which it was nominated for an Academy Award.
Another criticism is the alleged "toning down" of the film. Apparently, a working version of the film was much darker and more faithful to the source material, but it was edited to make it more appealing for younger children. Some examples of scenes from the book removed from the film include Olaf threatening to chop off one of Sunny's toes with a large knife from The Reptile Room and Olaf pushing Aunt Josephine off a boat into the leech-infested lake in The Wide Window. In the film, Count Olaf threatens Violet and Klaus with the knife in order to force them to let him enter the house, and instead of pushing Aunt Josephine into the lake, he just leaves her in the sinking boat to drown as Lemony Snicket interrupts, saying "Well, you get the picture." (There was footage shot of Aunt Josephine sinking in the lake, with digital leeches to be added in later, but it was cut both for time purposes and its slightly gruesome quality.)
Some fans of the books were disappointed by the portrayal of Count Olaf as silly and childish. The timeline of the story was also rearranged, putting the wedding at the end of the film, whereas it is in the very first book.
The film won an Academy Award for Makeup and was nominated for the awards for Original Music Score, Costume Design, and Art Direction.
[edit] Home video release
The DVD (widescreen and fullscreen versions) and VHS video were released on 26 April 2005. There is also a two-disc widescreen DVD Special Edition. The standard DVD package contains a single disc with commentary track by the books' author Daniel Handler, in character as Lemony Snicket, along with director Brad Silberling. Throughout the commentary, Lemony Snicket criticizes the film, ostensibly for being too dismal and depressing. He claims that he was kidnapped, chained up in a small room and forced to watch the film. He points out discrepancies between the books and the film and accuses Silberling of not having read the books. During the scene in which the Lachrymose Leeches appear, Handler also sings and plays a song on the accordion ("Leeches...Leeches...should not be in a film..."). Circuit City included a second disc with further behind-the-scenes footage and original trailers within "specially marked packages," but this "Circuit City Bonus Disc" only contains a fraction of the further bonus material that is found within the widescreen Special Edition package.
The Lemony Snicket DVD sold by Target also comes with The Blank Book, a small diary. The DVD edition sold at Wal-Mart included a copy of The Bad Beginning.
[edit] Sequel
On the Unfortunate Events website, the question "Are you going to make another movie?" is asked and Lemony Snicket replies: "It is known to only a handful of people whom are currently bound and gagged and locked in a cupboard. However, should it be of any use at all, I can tell you that one of them is known as Lethal Verity Sky". Lethal Verity Sky could be an anagram for "That's very likely".
[edit] References to others of the series' books
The film contains a number of passing references to other installments in A Series of Unfortunate Events aside from those on which it was based. Among them are:
- In the scene in the Baudelaire's gutted mansion, where Klaus picks up a spyglass, the letters V.F.D. can be seen on a box within the desk. These letters form an important plot point within the novels. The box appears to contain "Verdant Flammable Devices", mentioned in the 10th book The Slippery Slope.
- The shop called the 'Last Chance General Store' appears in the eighth book The Hostile Hospital.
- The shopkeeper in the 'Last Chance General Store' is reading The Daily Punctilio. The headline reads "Orphans to Blame?". The sensationalist and incorrect news reporting of The Daily Punctilio' are relevant to the second half of the series.
- In the 'Last Chance General Store', Count Olaf is seen reading the Dramalogue magazine. On the back cover of the magazine is an advertisement for a "Veritable French Diner", a place mentioned in Lemony Snicket: The Unauthorized Autobiography. On the front, it shows Lon Chaney from The Phantom of the Opera.
- When Aunt Josephine is showing pictures to the children, Klaus comments "Wow, you tamed lions?". This is a possible reference to The Carnivorous Carnival and The Slippery Slope, both of which made reference to V.F.D. using trained lions to detect smoke. Later, the lions were captured by the fire-starting section of V.F.D. to use as aids in crime.
- Present in the film's credit backdrop are three zeppelins. Each one contains the letters "V", "F", and "D".
[edit] Trivia
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Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines. The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones. |
- When Klaus tells Olaf that Pasta Puttenesca means "pasta the easy way" he was incorrect, it actually means "pasta the way a whore would make it"[citation needed] this might be deliberate fault of the writers, considering the movies PG rating.
- The end credits give no credit to end-title-director Jamie Caliri or his crew.
- The movie employed several sites for viral marketing: CountOlaf.com, WhiteFacedWomen.com, and HookHandedMan.com. The later two have since been taken down.
- When the Incredibly Deadly Viper escapes from its cage, viewers can see the handle turning on the outside.
- In 2005, Viacom, the parent company of US distributor Paramount Pictures, purchased international distributor DreamWorks. Paramount then sold the DreamWorks live-action library, but kept distribution rights to the films, and therefore, Paramount now controls the worldwide rights to Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events.
- Tim Burton was originally engaged to direct this film, with Johnny Depp playing Count Olaf. When Burton left the project, Depp left as well. Also connected with the project while Burton was there were Helena Bonham-Carter, who was cast as Justice Strauss, and Glenn Close, who was cast as Aunt Josephine (Close did not leave the project when Burton left, but was fired by Brad Silberling, who felt that Meryl Streep better suited the role).[4]
- It is not explicitly told where the action takes place, but the address on the letter the children get from their parents at the end of the movie reads "28 Prospero Place, Boston, MA, U.S.A.".
- On the back of the envelope that the children get from their parents at the end of the movie, it reads "Groetjes uit Antwerpen". This means that the parents were on holiday in Belgium when they sent the letter.
[edit] See also
- Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events, the soundtrack to the movie by Thomas Newman
[edit] References
- ^ 'Lemony' a lovable comedy for all ages | www.azstarnet.com
- ^ ROTTEN TOMATOES: The results are enthralling, a term that here means 'an improvement upon the best-selling books.'
- ^ http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/lemony_snicket/ Rottentomatoes.com Retrieved on 04-20-07
- ^ http://www.notstarring.com/movies/lemony-snicket-s-a-series-of-unfortunate-events Notstarring.com Retrieved on 04-20-07
[edit] External links
- Official Site
- Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events at the Internet Movie Database
- Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events at Allmovie
- Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events at Rotten Tomatoes
- Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events at Metacritic
- Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events at Box Office Mojo
- Script-O-Rama: Lemony Snicket's A Series of Unfortunate Events transcript
| Preceded by Ocean's Twelve |
Box office number-one films of 2004 (USA) December 19, 2004 |
Succeeded by Meet the Fockers |
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