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Example research essay topic: Hester And Dimmesdale Mistress Hibbins - 1,388 words

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Films of this age are often criticized for lacking substance and compensate for this discrepancy with explosions and elaborate camera work. Books, on the other hand, demand a bit more respect from the general public. Many believe that concocting a script is an unsophisticated mode of writing, a copper to the gold of a novel. After careful scrutiny of both, the novel, The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne and viewing the rendition of the Scarlet Letter by Roland Joffe, one can immediately comprehend the enormous amount of work put into both, as well as the innumerable differences and similarities between them. It is easy enough to discern the common and uncommon features but one must think of why the filmmaker may have used a specific lighting, or how colors were used to symbolize themes from the book. Analysis answers the questions: How did the two differ?

How were they the same? Why did the filmmaker make these decisions? The film is freely adapted from the novel. The word free describing the modification is well used; there are major differences in regard to time usage, characterization, visual imagery and symbolism, narration, plot, and tone. The first hour of the movie was devoted to informing the viewer about the background.

The film was set in motion when Hester arrived in the New World, not at the grim prison door she passed through on her way to the scaffold in the novel. Many characters not included in the novel were inserted into the film, several of whom were pivotal to the plot. Mituba, Hester's introverted slave girl, Brewster, the coarse, undisciplined rule-breaker, Goody Gotwick, the mouthpiece of the community's pious women, and Minister Cheever, the influential church leader who attempted to serve as the judge of the community's morals did not exist in the novel. Mistress Hibbins relationship to Governor Bellingham was ambiguous and not well portrayed.

It was almost as if they were acquaintances. In the book, their connection prevented her persecution, whereas in the movie, no familial bond protected mistress Hibbins from the cruel witch trials typical of the seventeenth century. Her minor function in the in the book, evolved into an imperative role in the movie. In addition to Hester, mistress Hibbins was as the only character that behaved according to her personal beliefs, and not the traditional values of the Puritans.

Dimmesdale's character was stronger in the film and certainly less beleaguered. He did not appear to suffer any internal conflict, and was actively involved in all occasions except for one involving Mistress Hibbins, when he became furious that Hester had hidden her from the magistrates. He longed for Hester to name him as her co-sinner, and genuinely despised hiding behind a hypocritical silence. When Hester refused to name her lover in the book, Dimmesdale had this reaction: She will not speak! murmured Dimmesdale, who, leaning over the balcony, with his hand upon his heart, had awaited the result of his appeal. He now drew back, with a long respiration.

Wondrous strength and generosity of a womans heart! She will not speak! He was calmed by the fact that Hester possessed such strength. The pressure was off him. He sighed and sat back, while he admiring her courage. In the same scene in the film, the viewer could see only Dimmesdale's pleading physiognomy and a distorted mass of spectators while he begged Hester to reveal him, to purge him of his sin.

Dimmesdale also displayed tremendous strength through tirelessly visiting Hester's prison cell every day, disregarding the convention that she was to receive no visitors; each day he was wrestled from the prison door by several beadles. In the novel, Dimmesdale was not inclined to do anything with the possibility of arousing suspicion. Chillingsworth had little affect on Dimmesdale in the film. Hester provided her lover with an abundance of information about her ex- husband; within seconds of their meeting; Dimmesdale was very alert to the black mans presence. Chillingsworth's evil influence played more of a public role, not restricted to the slow consumption of a weak mans sanity and conscience. Chillingsworth stirred the community into hatred for the Indians.

The characterization of Pearl in the film differed largely from her sprite-like appearance, unencumbered by rule attitude she adopted in the book. She appeared as a sweet, obedient child. Pearl showed no real interest her mother letter; it was she who discarded it beneath the horse carriage as Hester, Dimmesdale, and herself left at the conclusion of the film for their new life in the Carolinas. In Hawthorne's novel, Pearl held the letter as almost an appendage of her mothers. She sketch it, brood over it, and refused to speak with her mother the few times she removed it from her breast, intractably fixing herself on the opposite side of the stream from Dimmesdale and Hester; she was wild and untamed. More emphasis was placed on the outward lives of the characters because of the visual nature all film; one cannot hear their emotionally tortured thoughts.

Hester, for example, seems to be living a reasonably happy life with Pearl and Mituba. She is viewed as taking the circumstances well because of her tough public face and her callous personality. Many hours of film devoted to displaying her thoughts and feelings would be required in order to effectively show the viewer what the reader sees. There are also a number of plot differences between the film and the novel, some of which emanate from the introduction of new characters. Chillingsworth hung himself after accidentally scalping Brewster instead of Dimmesdale; in the book he died a year after Dimmesdale passed away on the scaffold. Hester's affair was revealed when she gave birth to Pearl, but in the film she admitted it herself when Goody Gotwick told the magistrates she believed Hester was suffering from morning sickness.

Several other minute details differed in the film, such as the infamous A. The film version of the letter was fairly simple: a solid, capital, bright red A with a black background, definitely not a masterwork of embroidery. The A of the novel was finely sewn in gold thread on a blazing, fervent background; it was a renowned ignominy of both, passion and sin. The prison door Hawthorne acquainted the reader with was eroded and implanted with spikes, which encompassed gloom, and oppression, not newly built of entwined with iron.

The fates of the characters were much different as well. Hester and Dimmesdale escaped to live a blissful life in the Carolinas at the end of the film. Chillingsworth hung himself. Hester's services to the community were minimal or nonexistent.

She seemed only to relate well with Mistress Hibbins and some of the other women who are not part of the strict Puritan community. Pearl is narrator of the film. Pearl seems more impartial in her views than the narrator in the novel. There was more of a sense of having to achieve atonement for sin in the novel hence Pearls depiction as being almost a devil-child. Some of the similarities noted in both the novel and the film are the concepts of original sin, lust, the symbolic use of the color red, Chillingsworth evil nature, the theme of the uncivilized and witchcraft, and the Puritanical obsession with rules and order. Hawthorne and Joffe both placed an emphasis on the concept of original sin.

Hester, upon first seeing her new home in the film, referred to it as a paradise, her version of Eden. The books early symbol of the rosebush gave the reader some idea of how the narrator felt about sin. While the rose was beautiful, it was guarded by thorns and bloomed directly outside the prison door; its positive and negative traits were inseparable. In other words, while love and passion are beautiful, they cannot be separated from the conscience and concept of sin.

The city in the film was saturated with evil; it was governed strictly by rules alone. It was no more saintly in its virtuous beliefs than Hester and Dimmesdale. While the viewer had a sense that the narrator felt that what happened between Hester and Dimmesdale was consecrated by God, the theme of punishment for sin persists. Pearl, at the films conclusion, stated that her fathers death at a young age and her mothers consequent lo...


Free research essays on topics related to: hester and dimmesdale, prison door, mistress hibbins, original sin, scarlet letter

Research essay sample on Hester And Dimmesdale Mistress Hibbins

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