Film
The Remains of the Day
- Director
- James Ivory
- Certificate
- U
- Running Time
- 134 mins
Merchant-Ivory‘s greatest triumph: a haunting, sensitively scripted portrait of repressed emotion, showcasing Anthony Hopkins and Emma Thompson at their best. Hopkins is the impeccably servile butler Stevens, who takes on prim housekeeper Miss Kenton (Thompson). But such is his futile devotion to duty that Stevens brusquely rebuffs her tentative romantic advances until she seeks affection elsewhere.
From the Wodehousian humour of Stevens explaining the facts of life to Darlington’s dim godson Hugh Grant to the pure comic absurdity of the butler’s exaggerated formality in his relationship with Miss Kenton, this is the first Merchant-Ivory to offer genuine belly laughs. And the remarkable thing about Hopkins is how little he actually does to communicate subtle nuances of character – a raised hand here, an uncomprehending look there – while animated Thompson and her trademark trembly lower lip act as a perfect foil to his economy of expression.
Local film location spotters may wish to know that much of The Remains of the Day was shot round these parts. ‘Darlington Hall’ was a patchwork of Badminton House, Corsham Court and Dyrham Park. The film also uses Weston-super-Mare extensively (the Grand Pier, Highbury Hotel, and Winter Gardens Pavilion) and the pubs visited by Anthony Hopkins are the George Inn in Norton St. Philip and the Hop Pole Inn in Limpney Stoke.
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