Lady Windermere's Fan (1925) (2007 MoMA restoration)

Ernst Lubitsch: Lady Windermere's Fan (US 1925) with May McAvoy (Lady Windermere) and Ronald Colman (Lord Darlington).

Lady Windermeren viuhka / Lady Windermeres solfjäder.
    US © 1925 Warner Bros. P+D: Ernst Lubitsch. SC: Julian Josephson – from the play by Oscar Wilde (1892). DP: Charles J. Van Enger, Willard van Anger.
    Starring: Ronald Colman (Lord Darlington), Irene Rich (Mrs. Erlynne), May McAvoy (Lady Windermere), Bert Lytell (Lord Windermere), Edward Martindel (Lord Augustus).
    2382 m /20 fps/ 104 min.
    MoMA restored print, tinted and toned /20 fps/ 98 min.
    Screened at Cinema Orion, Helsinki, 6 March 2008.

Here is a case of a film whose full substance has become apparent again with the availability of a restored version. In the 1980s there was a shorter version available (77 min at 20 fps); this long version does not add to the narrative but the slow, original tempo brings out the full intensity of the subject.

This film belongs to the dozen most notable examples of literary classics made into films of equal stature, comparable to: – Werther (Goethe / Ophuls) – Partie de campagne (Maupassant / Renoir) – Journal d'un curé de campagne (Bernanos / Bresson) – My Childhood (Gorky / Donskoy)

Wilde and Lubitsch are soulmates. Lubitsch kept the subject, the story and the four-part structure of Wilde's play, threw away every witticism, added sequences of Mrs. Erlynne with Lord Windermere and a racetrack sequence where the reactions of the noble set to Mrs. Erlynne replace what Wilde expressed via dialogue.

Of course, Lubitsch relishes the symbolism of the fan, the main prop, comparable to the cane in So This Is Paris.

The character of Lady Windermere is not as childish as with Wilde.

Wilde's play was an attack on Victorian hypocrisy, Lubitsch's film was produced at the height of the Jazz Age. Interestingly, he removed Wilde's frivolity and replaced it with gravity.

The print does justice to the subtle visual elegance of the film, although apparently from duped source material. There is a full scale of black and white, and the tinting and toning is stylish.

A great review by Darragh O'Donoghue: http://www.sensesofcinema.com/contents/cteq/04/lady_windermeres_fan.html

Still the best Oscar Wilde film (that I have seen).