the personal history of david copperfield by charles dickens

The nurse Peggoty ( Daisy May Cooper) is the first quotable “Dickensian” David meets. We see his birth, and see and hear older David ( Dev Patel, wonderful in the part) “photo bomb” the moment he came into the world, “narrating” his story as he does. “You should write that down,” little David ( Ranveer Jaiswal) is told, any time somebody in his orbit says memorable. Yes, “The words have skates, and skim away” in this “Copperfield,” a movie that leaps to its feet and sprints away on a carpet of colorful dialect, incisive description and hilariously witty turns of phrase. “She’s a human mangle, that woman!” “What a world of gammon and spinach!” “I regret that I missed the wedding - and the chance to meet you at the peak of your beauty.” This is a Dickens that compares to Shakespeare, not just in characters and emotions and plotting, but in the realm of words. By framing this within young Copperfield’s similarities to his creator’s biography, Iannucci has created a Dickens adaptation that elevates the writer (if that was possible) to the very top of the list of Greatest in the English Language. And none of us make that journey alone Every heroine or hero in life and in the novel struggles, tries to make something of him or herself while maintaining dignity and returning to kindness, even when you catch yourself straying from it.Īnd the co-adapter/director just wallows in Dickens’ words. He’s not just “the hero of my own story,” we all are.

And casting people of many ethnicities highlights what’s already in the book, and easily ignored. Copperfield’s struggle to escape his past is not a white man’s journey, it is EveryJourney from poverty to gentility. The “color blind” casting underlines the master’s universality.

Iannucci, who gave us “The Death of Stalin,” “Veep,” ” In the Loop,” and who got his start with the dark, droll and ridiculous “Alan Partridge” TV series with Steve Coogan, does two things “to” Dickens and his eponymous hero here. Timing is everything, and if ever the time was right for a sunny, shimmering, dizzy and diversity-embracing adaptation of Charles Dickens’ “David Copperfield,” this is it.Īrmando Iannucci conjures - the only word for it - “The Personal History of David Copperfield” out of Dickens’ universal truths, and the man’s unmatched ear for dialect and way with words.

The personal history of david copperfield by charles dickens