Criterion Collection - Online Cinematheque

The words “David Lean” and “laughter” aren’t often used in the same sentence, but our recent reminder of the British drama and epic maker’s good humor, in the form of the DVD release of Hobson’s Choice, may help change that. In the New York Times, Dave Kehr calls this 1954 comedy, about an 1880s Mancunian boot shop proprietor’s battle of wills with his eldest daughter, “a delightful period comedy . . . The spectacle of the staunch, strong-willed Maggie battering her father’s pride while she elevates the subservient Willie into a confident businessman is irresistible, as is the profusion of detail Lean crams into every frame.” Vying for space in that frame is the larger-than-life Charles Laughton, who, Tom Russo writes in the Boston Globe, “is in fine, comically cantankerous form.” The Boston Herald’s James Verniere also lavishes praise on the actor: “Using his bulk and marvelously expressive face to great comic advantage, the great Laughton transforms . . . Hobson into a Victorian-era Lear.”

Still, its unusual display of comedy notwithstanding, the film fits right in with Lean’s more dramatic works, asserts Donna Bowman in the Onion: “Hobson’s Choice embodies the very best of the intimate Lean, while anticipating the startling clarity of vision he would later bring to the North African desert and the Russian steppes.” Similarly, in Slant Jeremiah Kipp argues that Lean’s talents transcended genre: “David Lean simply knew where to put the camera—to tell stories through images that convey a sense of mood, place, character, and conflict . . . Hobson’s Choice is a superb addition to the Lean canon, and a charming and surprising selection by Criterion.”

Categories: Press Notes