The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
by Lies
After watching “the Brodie movie” for the first time, about a year ago, I remember I sort of jumped up, started applauding, and then told my mother I did not want to be an actress after all, because the chances I ever got good enough to so much as clean Dame Maggie’s shoes were highly doubtful. And though I’m still as acting-obsessed as I ever was, the last line remains an eternal truth, because it just is a damn, damn good movie- perhaps the best one Maggie ever did, and definitely the one which earned her a very deserved first Academy Award.
“Jean Brodie”- based on a novel by Muriel Spark- is mainly about a woman, Miss Jean Brodie, whose dangerously progressive ideas and over-romantic attitude towards life lead her into a lot of problems with her conservative surroundings. Her downfall, though, is in the end not caused by those very same surroundings, but by one of her “insiders”, her “Brodie gals”- someone who betrayed her.
Though Dame Maggie already starts off terrific- when does she not?- during the humorous first part of the movie, the downfall shows that she can just as well play a tragedy, and play it damn well. Her Miss Brodie is addictive, graceful and often admirable, yet, in her way, always somehow dangerous. One watches and cannot but feel a certain affection for her, and at the same time one knows very well that she is, like it is said in the movie, dangerous for people indeed.
One thing is sure; the prime of Miss Jean Brodie may have ended ages ago- the prime of Miss Maggie Smith never will. And thank God for that.