I Capture The Castle [DVD] [2003]

Bill Nighy is first-rate as Cassandra's cantankerous father, an author who wrote a ground-breaking experimental novel 12 years before but hasn't written a word since, forcing his family to end up living in extreme poverty in a crumbling ruin of a castle. At first I didn't take to Tara Fitzgerald's version of Topaz. I felt she was too cynical and brittle, as after all the adorable Topaz (one of my very favourite characters in fiction) is an incurable romantic, but she grew on me, and eventually I could see that she was simply bringing out Topaz's practical side more. The two girls playing Rose (who yearns for "a little black suit with matching suede accessories", and peach-coloured towels in her bathroom) and Cassandra are also well-cast and play their characters with great commitment. And I'm glad more was done with Thomas, the bespectacled, academic little brother. In the book he often comes across as the only member of the family with any clear idea of what's going on everywhere, and they've brought this out in the film.

The castle itself was a bit disappointing, looking sometimes like left-over sets from the BBC's "Gormenghast" series. In the book it seems almost like a real place, it's so vivid, but here it seemed more like the setting for a fantasy film, all blurred around the edges. But that's a small criticism really. I feel this was always going to be a difficult one to film, but they've done a pretty good job here. Highly recommended, especially if you're a big romantic at heart.

I Capture the Castle is narrated in the first person by seventeen-year-old Cassandra (Romola Garai). Cassandra is a dreamy and wistful kind of girl who obsessively writes in her dairy and possesses a vivid romantic imagination. Cassandra is the younger sister of the flighty and more beautiful redheaded Rose (Rose Byrne). It's 1936, and they live in a crumbling, leaky, and cold rural English castle that James (Bill Nighy), their novelist dad has leased to inspire his next masterpiece.

Bad times have recently fallen on the family. Due to an accident that involved their mother, James now suffers writers block and has become a seedy, lanky, and desperate-looking man. He scored a brilliant success 20 years ago with his first novel, but now he's been artistically silent and fallow ever since, a pale shadow of what he once was. The family indulges him, hoping against hope that he'll eventually find artistic inspiration, while they try desperately to eke out a miserly and penny-pinching living.

The girls, especially Rose, despair about escaping their dank, dreary world. Only kid brother Thomas (Joe Sowerbutts) is untroubled by the family's debt and decay. Thankfully, Rose finally sees a way to escape her parsimonious existence, when two wealthy and handsome American brothers arrive at the castle to claim their inheritance.

Hardy, butch, and blustery Neil (Marc Blucas) is distrustful of the family's neediness, and views both Rose and Cassandra as gold diggers, while the earnest, bookish, and more sensitive Simon (Henry Thomas) soon falls for the money-hungry Rose. Simon also has eyes for Cassandra, as does Stephen (Henry Cavill), a handsome and sexy farmhand. Watching over the proceedings is the flamboyant Mrs. Cotton, the boys' wealthy, chic mother (played by the wonderful Sinead Cusack).

As the story unfolds, the lovely and naïve Cassandra finds herself getting caught in the middle of smoldering passions and misguided romance. She's never quite certain what or whom she wants and spends her days trying to decide within her heart what she should do. Should she admit her feelings to Simon who is still smitten with Rose, or should she commit to Stephen who has always harbored a secret desire for her?

Unlike her radiant but avaricious sister Rose - who is faced with a character-defining choice between love and money, and chooses money - Cassandra at least grasps the countless value of the former, whose heartbreak always can be tempered by hope. For Cassandra, true Love is a risky, and unpredictable endeavor and almost always illusive.

I Capture the Castle is British film making at its best. With director, Tim Fywell, gently and tenderly transporting us to the genteel era of prewar England. Even the story's very discretion is appealing. We know that sex is going on and fueling the action, but it's mostly hidden from our view and only strategically hinted at.

But what makes this film really shine are the actors. Filled with pretty people - Blucas, Cavill, and Thomas are especially attractive; it's actually the appealing young actresses who play Rose and Cassandra who really steal the film. Like delicate English roses they constantly light up the screen, one as sturdy and as robust as the earth, and the other, in love with love, unapologetically obsessed with dreams of money and wealth. Mike Leonard July 05.