Fiennes IS Dickens - he both looks like him and captures the Victorian celebrity brilliantly. Felicity Jones does an excellent job in a much more restricted role spanning the 2 very different scenarios of her current and former lives. However the film is overlong and at its close, I felt I knew little more of Ellen Ternan than I did at the beginning. It is not immediately apparent to the audience that the precarious nature of the acting profession underlies both Nelly's lack of choice in becoming Dickens' mistress and her sister's switch to a governess role. The audience is led to believe Nelly chose the role of mistress from love, hence the protracted mourning, but this does not ring true and in reality she had little choice in the matter. Her mother's collusion in the affair is a comment on the social and moral structure of Victorian England and is well depicted in the film. Dickens is cruel to his family and I never sense real happiness and joy in the relationship with Nelly as one would expect in an affair. Fiennes portrayal makes it clear Dickens adored her, but within certain bounds, whereas Nelly's feelings remain inscrutable, even ambivalent, as does her relationship with her later husband. The flashbacks comprise so much of the film as to make a nonsense of Nelly's later life and there seems no resolution to the anguish portrayed, which seems out of proportion. Nelly was required to be 'Invisible' having chosen a particular path and the film does little to shed light on her despite the undoubted skills of the actors.
Review of The Invisible Woman
