Mark Reviews Movies: THE PERSONAL HISTORY OF DAVID COPPERFIELD

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Review by Mark Dujsik | August 27, 2020

One might argue that co-writer/director Armando Iannucci isn't taking Charles Dickens' David Copperfield seriously. The filmmaker's approach to the material can, after all, only be described as a bit cheeky, filled with constant jokes and running gags.

Iannucci and co-writer Simon Blackwell even dare to change some of Dickens' plot, altering the deaths during a climactic shipwreck amidst a raging storm and excising an entire character from the narrative before her purpose in Dickens' story can be fulfilled. The Personal History of David Copperfield probably isn't for the Dickens faithful (Can any adaptation that's not a multi-part series really be for those who would cling so tightly to the works?), but it is, perhaps, perfect for those who appreciate the spirit more than the text.

Dickens probably wouldn't have an issue with this approach, although there's obviously no evidence to back up that idea. Well, maybe there is. Lest one forget, while the title of Iannucci's adaptation is longer than most previous film and television versions, it is still considerably shorter than Dickens' own full title for his book: The Personal History, Adventures, Experience and Observation of David Copperfield the Younger of Blunderstone Rookery (Which He Never Meant to Publish on Any Account). If that's not a cheeky enough title for you, we have very different definitions of playful humor in intentionally and ironically elongated titles of works of fiction.

The framework of the plot in Iannucci and Blackwell's screenplay remains more or less the same. It concerns a young David Copperfield, who remains youthful through the entirety of the film, instead of reaching middle age by the end. The character is played by Dev Patel, the English actor of Indian descent, which is only worth noting because Iannucci's casting is so inspired.

We often and implicitly consider the classic works of English fiction to be populated by people who look a certain way, but Iannucci sees this adaptation in a different way. The story belongs to Dickens first, whose politics were quite liberal and whose writing (including the book in question here) often and overtly expressed those views. It belongs to the British second, and in that regard, Iannucci sees the full range of racial and ethnic diversity of the country, both then and now. It belongs to all of humanity third, although perhaps most vitally.

For here is the story of a person, who faces multiple crises of identity and obstacles of fate and circumstance. Such a story belongs to everyone, and Iannucci's casting doesn't simply affirm that idea. The film makes it tangible.

The screenplay's framing device has an older David reading the story of his life to an audience in a small theater. That famous opening line remains a most universal worry and challenge: "Whether I shall turn out to be the hero of my own life, or whether that station will be held by anybody else, these pages must show." As David reaches the event of his birth, the backdrop of the stage falls, and the audience in the theater is transported to the Copperfield estate (The film doesn't overwhelm us with such stylistic flourishes, but they do amuse, such as a night on the town played like a silent movie). There, the young man's beloved, widowed mother Clara (Morfydd Clark, who makes a rather loaded return later, as one of David's romantic interests) has gone into labor.

Time passes. A young David becomes fascinated by words and quirky turns of phrase. He learns of life outside the manor with the help of family maid Peggotty (Daisy May Cooper), whose extended family of social outcasts lives in an overturned boat by the sea (It is so colorful in the view of his childhood, but a return in adulthood sees it for the sad thing that it is). David's mother marries the wicked Mr. Murdstone (Darren Boyd), who cannot stand perceived slights against his power—especially from a stubborn, fanciful boy. The stepfather sends David to work in a bottling factory, where he becomes a man and, after the unexpected death of his mother, from whence his adventures begin.

To explicate any more of the plot would be pointless. While there is a lot—involving various homes and potential loves and assorted friends and financial chicanery from a seemingly pathetic man whose life somewhat reflects David's own before revealing villainy—in this story, the filmmakers are primarily concerned with the characters who enter, exit, return, and either remain or depart from David's life. More than plot, Dickens loved his characters, many of whom have been beloved by almost two centuries' worth of readers, and Iannucci and Blackwell return the favor of these adored creations.

To list all of them would be an additional feat within limited space, and even to describe the most prominent ones would be a challenge. There is, for example, Mr. Micawber (Peter Capaldi), a serial debtor who cares for David while he works at the factory. Unable to get out of debt for the entirety of the story, he repeatedly returns with a sincerely jovial spirit that seems counter to his perpetually outstretched hand. David's great-aunt Betsey (Tilda Swinton) is an odd one, always emotionally distant (except when chasing donkeys off her estate), but with a good heart, and her distant cousin Mr. Dick (Hugh Laurie) is convinced that the thoughts of King Charles I entered his head after the king lost his own.

There are more, of course—including Dora (Clark), the flighty woman David is convinced he loves, and the level-headed Agnes (Rosalind Eleazar), whom David doesn't realize he loves. They're all cast perfectly, all lovably (or pitifully, in the case of Ben Whishaw's buzzard-like villain Uriah Heep) eccentric, and all treated with as much sympathy as humor. Patel's David (given almost as many new names as the number of people he befriends before he finds and asserts his identity) is a rock of deadpan delivery and genuine, if conflicted, decency amidst the raucous cast of oddballs.

As for any possible claim that Iannucci isn't taking this material seriously, the film's eventual, subtle shift in tone is a solid counterpoint (Just before his fortunes turn, David notices and film focuses on impoverished people living in London's streets). The whole of The Personal History of David Copperfield, including its affectionately joking ways, is all the evidence we need of the filmmakers' sincere adoration for Dickens' novel.

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