[Omah]

http://channelhopping.onthebox.com/2...p-the-younger/

Many people who’ve read the book might agree that Gillian Anderson is still a little young to play the spinster who never recovered from a jilting. Yet she plays the part well and has certainly found her niche in these productions over the last few years, from Bleak House to this January’s The Crimson Petal and the White, it seems the years she spent living in London as a child had a profound affect on her. She captures the ethereal nature of Havisham brilliantly and there are also hints of her menace in this opening episode. At this stage we watch as she trains her adopted daughter Estella to resist the lures of men, but it soon becomes clear that her twisted soul has manifested itself in a far more sinister plan and she attempts to hurt menfolk through her beautiful heir. As such, Pip’s heart is her plaything and we see early evidence of this here when she wrongfoots him with the apprenticeship. After a decade of playing a mainstream American icon, it seems fitting that the self-confessed High School oddball has returned to her roots. And just like any of the Dickensian antiheroes, Miss Havisham must be a joy.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/t...ne-review.html

At 43, Gillian Anderson is the youngest actress to play Miss Havisham and looks it; you’d never guess she’s only a few years younger than Martita Hunt, whose grande dame interpretation of the role in David Lean’s 1946 film (which the BFI is re-releasing in February) is still considered definitive. So it was almost a shock to meet this pale yet still beautiful wraith, mouth in need of lip salve and Baby Jane ringlets slowly unravelling, speaking in insidious singsong instead of the usual dotty dowager tones. This was a Miss Havisham who has never really grown up.

Oscar Kennedy was compelling as young Pip, but when he grew into young adulthood the production took its first misstep. It’s not that Douglas Booth was bad, nor that Vanessa Kirby (who plays Miss Havisham’s ward) is unattractive, it’s just that one can’t imagine Dickens ever intended Pip to be more beautiful than Estella, who, after all, has been brought up to break men’s hearts..