Great Expectations To Close 2012 London Film Festival
Mike Newell’s adaptation of Charles Dickens’ seminal novel Great Expectations will close the 56th London Film Festival later this year on October 21. Starter For Ten and One Day’s David Nicholls has written the script which will star Helena Bonham Carter, Ralph Fiennes, Robbie Coltrane and Jeremy Irvine, who will play the lead role of Pip.
This screening will be the European premiere of Newell’s work and is set to be preceded by Tim Burton’s Frankenweenie, which will open the festival on October 10 and sees the gothic director elongate his 1984 short film.. Of course, the connection between these two movies is Burton’s wife, Bonham Carter, who will play the role of Ms. Havisham in the latest incarnation of Dickens’ opus.
The Four Weddings and a Funeral director told the BBC that “It’s a great honour to be invited to be the BFI London Film Festival’s closing night film. I’ve tried to make a film that is true to the theatrical vividness, energetic characters and high colour that (Dickens) is loved for.”
Newell clearly hasn’t been overawed adapting the literary deities work, revealing that he has written a new ending for what he has labelled his “thriller” version of the film.
“Dickens came up with two endings – one which is incredibly bleak and one which is unrealistically romantic and sentimental. Neither are quite satisfactory and we’ve come up with an ending that is somewhere in between.”
Great Expectations will be released in the United Kingdom on November 30, whilst the remaining programme for this year’s London Film Festival will be unveiled on September 5.
