Madame Bovary

I watched the recent (2014?) adaptation of Madame Bovary the other night. I read the book many years ago and had mixed feelings about it. It was fascinating and riveting and sexy. But the main character, Emma Bovary, was hard to sympathize with.

This version is okay. It is interesting but falls flat emotionally. The story is about a young woman who marries a country doctor and suffers from intense boredom and a sense of being trapped in a mundanity and mediocrity. Her husband is kind, but dull. Also he is unambitious and unglamorous, which is a big deal to Emma. She begins to have affairs and gets deep in debt, both which lead to her downfall.

What seemed lacking in the movie was the intensity of her affairs. I remember from the book that they totally transported her. That they were passionate and all-consuming and gave her tremendous relief from her malaise. In this adaptation they just felt like a handful of liasons and the depth of emotion was not conveyed.