 | the fact of Estella's character would leave a healthy doubt as to their chances for happiness. For, in the novel, she does not relinquish herself, necessarily, to Pip. She remains aloof, still seems somewhat evil, and therefore retains her power over Pip, who desires nothing more than her love. Perhaps Estella is the classic female example of a woman who is loved, without necessarily loving in return. This, as Weldon and others seem to claim, is the true source of power: to be desired not just sexually, but totally, and to be unavailable, at least partially.
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| In the David Lean film, Estella is
still a virgin
when she finds Pip again, her husband-to-be having deserted her. In addition, she has become
nice
. Freed from Miss Havisham's spell, seemingly glad to be rid of all the teachings which she took so willingly at one time, Estella has undergone a transformation. She is good and virtuous and desires a relationship with a man. "In the film, she comes to Pip broken-hearted but with everything else intact. This much was demanded by a 1947 film audience, although apparently a reading public nearly ninety years earlier was tolerant enough to accept Estella as Pip's future wife despite the fact that she had been married and divorced" (from a lecture by Regina Barreca). Further, the film's romantic ending not only shows them getting together, but leaves little doubt of their happiness.
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| The film has provided what Shaw called "the ready-made and reach-me-downs of the ragshop in which Romance keeps its stock of 'happy endings' to misfit all stories" (p. 134). Surely, Dickens would be right in saying that nowhere in his novel did he hint at such a transformation on Estella's part. Why, then, does David Lean make this change? The answer lies within the pattern I have been establishing. Seductive, unloving, powerful women have no place in Hollywood. Even when they bring with them the authorization of the world's great authors, every film director is called upon to "somehow" make these great literary heroines nicer, more virtuous, more submissive, and less powerful.
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| Somebody by now must be aching to bring up that most popular of "evil" heroines, Scarlett O'Hara, from
Gone with the Wind
. But there too you see the same typical translation from book to film. In the book, Scarlett not only marries Charles Hamilton (her first husband), but she has several children by him. Later, she has more children by her second husband, Frank Kennedy. In the film, she has no children until her third marriage with Rhett Butler. What is the overall impact of this? Virginity. Or at least there's no proof of the opposite. Her marriages are necessary to move the plot forward; they can't be dropped as Estella's was dropped in
Great Expectations
. But the children can be deleted. And so the audience can be made to feel that Scarlett loses her precious innocence with the true romantic interest in the film, Rhett Butler. Early on in their epic "courtship," he says to her: "You need kissing badly. That's what's wrong with you. You should be kissed and often, and by someone who knows how." If we must acknowledge her past marriages, Rhett can still assure us that Scarlett has never ''really" been touched. Finally, when Rhett Butler does kiss her, it is as if for the first time in her life. He even makes this point: "You've been married to a boy and an old man, why not try a husband of the right age, with a way with women?" (They kiss passionately.) She begs him to stop, threatening to faint. He responds: "I want you to faint. This is what you were meant for. None of the fools you've ever known have kissed you like this, have
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