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(More customer reviews)In 1973 two theatrical version of Henrik Ibsen's classic play "A Doll's House" were filmed. This version, starring Claire Bloom as Nora, won national release, while the other, with Jane Fonda, ended up on ABC television. No other play from the 19th-century continued to be performed as often as "A Doll's House." The story is of what appears to be a normal family, Torvald Helmer (Anthony Hopkins), a bank lawyer, and his wife Nora, and their three small children. Torvald has blithely assumed his wife to be a flighty little thing, but Nora has been creating a facade to please her husband. Then we discover that in the past Nora forged a signature to get money to save her husband's life. When this act is revealed, Torvald is outraged and renounces his wife. Nora finally sees her husband for the miserable fraud he truly is and walks away from him and her children, leaving a stunned Torvald still trying to figure out who he has been married to all these years. Ibsen's play is a major classic of modern drama, one of the first superb character studies that provided a psychological portrait of an actual human being.
As in any production, this version of "A Doll's House" rests on the actress playing Nora. With Bloom's characterization Nora is presented as being more noble than usual; her habit of lying is played down and we get the sense she is clever and cunningly playing the game of being her husband's "doll." However, the result of this approach is less of an emotional range than I would expect with Nora. Hopkins is, as you would expect, fully up to the pompous, hollow figure of Torvald. Indeed, the final scene succeeds largely on his reactions to Nora's departure. For me, choosing between these two 1973 films is pretty much a toss up since I am not overly enamored with either of the interpretations of Nora, although there are parts of both performances that are quite strong. However, Bloom does have the advantage of a better supporting cast. Christopher Hampton wrote the adaptation from Ibsen's play for this film version, which was directed by Patrick Garland.
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A woman's struggle to have her voice heard in a man's world is "startlingly moving" (The Wall Street Journal) in this cinematic adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's famous play. "Superior performances" (The New York Times) by Claire Bloom (Crimes and Misdemeanors) and Oscar®winner* Anthony Hopkins (Hannibal) set the stage for an engrossing and remarkable drama.Nora (Bloom) will do anything to please her authoritarian husband Torvald (Hopkins). Per Torvald's instructions, Nora focuses on such womanly disciplines as dancing and taking care of babies whilehe sees to all the affairs of money. But when a past financial mistake comes back to haunt Nora, and Torvald finds out, the result is an explosion of fury and a shocking revelation that changes the course of the entire family forever. *1991: Actor, The Silence of the Lambs
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