I'm specifically talking about the second mini-series, which concentrates on the love affair between Jon and Fleur. The script departs in significant ways from the book, I suppose in order to make us sympathize more with the young lovers. To me it just made them more annoying. The aspect I find most problematic throughout: creating sympathy for Soames. I did not like Damian Lewis's portrayal of Soames, but I admit it's a tough part. Soames is outwardly stiff, cold, and rigid, but underneath he's seething with painful, unmet desires. By today's reckoning, he rapes Irene, but he would never have seen it that way. Yes, he would acknowledge that he took her by force that night, but he saw this as his right. If she had done her duty as a wife, it would not have been necessary. So if there was any ugliness to the act, it was her fault. He would have believed this entirely. He may have suffered occasional doubts about it, but Soames was deeply invested in seeing himself as having been wronged and Irene as a bad wife, pure and simple. He believed that til the day he died. The conciliatory scenes where he admits wrongdoing and actually makes some kind of peace with Irene after Jolyon's death -- absolutely claptrap. It's an example of today's scriptwriters re-making a story to fit our modern ideas about how people should behave, instead of remaining faithful to the source material. I object to that strongly.
Review of The Forsyte Saga
