We are now in the season of his beloved short story A Christmas Carol, but really, Charles Dickens never goes out of season. One of the 19th-century writer's most popular novels, Great Expectations, has been adapted to the screen many times. Most recently, Steven Knight's miniseries based on the novel came to Hulu in 2023, featuring Olivia Colman as the icon herself, Miss Havisham. However, going back a little more than a decade, the 2012 3-episode miniseries starring Gillian Anderson as Miss Havisham, Douglas Booth as Pip, and Vanessa Kirby as Estella ultimately takes the cake as one of the most visually stunning, well-acted Dickens adaptations so far. This iteration of the novel from director Brian Kirk really captures the tone of the novel and has a standout performance from Anderson that is one of the best of her career.
What Is 2012's 'Great Expectations' About?
Image via BBC
Great Expectations begins with a young Pip (Oscar Kennedy), an orphan who lives in the countryside with his older sister (Claire Rushbrook) and her husband, the blacksmith Joe Gargery (Shaun Dooley). Pip's unexpected journey is kicked into motion when he is stopped by an escaped convict named Abel Magwitch (Ray Winstone) while he is out on the moor. He steals a pie and a file from Joe's shop and helps Magwitch cut off his shackles. Later, Pip is invited to visit Satis House, the estate of a wealthy woman in town named Miss Havisham, who has an adopted daughter named Estella (Izzy Meikle-Small). These visits to Satis House become regular, and Pip begins to dream of life as a gentleman and falls for Estella. When Pip reaches adulthood, he receives a small fortune from an unknown benefactor and the opportunity to move to London and become a gentleman.
'Great Expectations' Does the Charles Dickens Novel and Characters Justice
Being a lengthy novel with complicated characters, it would seem daunting to adapt Great Expectations to the screen, but Kirk succeeds to great effect. Booth's performance is riveting as he explores different sides of Pip in his battle with the "great expectations" that are placed upon him. When he first arrives in London, he is naïve and unsure of himself, shown in a perfect scene where his roommate Herbert Pocket (Harry Lloyd) teaches him how to dance and he continuously trips over himself. But as time goes on, Booth changes accents to a more posh London one, learns how to win the game of social interactions, and develops a crippling shame about where he comes from, so much so that when Joe shows up unannounced, Pip can't even look him in the eye and pretends that he doesn't know him.
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Meanwhile, Kirby's Estella is much more than she seems at first. Raised by a mother who instilled a ruthless cruelty in her and trained her to intentionally manipulate people's emotions, Estella at moments seems like a villain, but she and Pip also develop a genuine connection, and she frequently tells him that she is worried she simply cannot feel love because she never learned what it felt like. At times, she even tries to protect him from Miss Havisham's dark schemes. Winstone's Magwitch, even in his violence and gruffness, has tender moments like when he realizes Pip brought him a pie not out of fear but from the goodness of his heart, and the expression of being moved is clear in his eyes. Kirk's adaptation honors Dickens' characters who are not all bad or all good, making the series an emotionally gripping watch.
'Great Expectations' Miss Havisham Is Gillian Anderson at Her Best
Another key element of Great Expectations that Kirk does very well is capturing the melancholy spookiness of the novel. In the novel, Satis House is itself a character. In her youth, Miss Havisham was left at the altar on her wedding day, and in her grief, she has left the house in the exact state it was on her wedding day, complete with the entire banquet feast. The rotting wedding cake sits in the middle of her cobwebbed, moldering dining room while she walks about in her tattered wedding dress. All of these darkly beautiful details are brought to life in the film with BAFTA and Emmy-winning production design by David Roger.
Anderson’s performance is spellbinding in this series and complements the haunted, ethereal quality of Satis House. She walks barefoot, never making a sound as she goes up and down the stairs, and her expressions are subtle and quiet, all of which make her seem more ghostly than human. Even stranger, she speaks with a high-pitched, childlike voice which makes her seem trapped in a much younger version of herself and repeatedly scratches at one of her hands, resulting in bloody sores that stand out against her white hair and dress. This isn't the only time Anderson manipulated her voice in an interesting way — her performance as Margaret Thatcher on The Crown is another great example. This character work from Anderson has the effect of making Miss Havisham seem like a ghost in her own life, unable to move on from that one fateful day. While this adaptation has never gotten the recognition it deserves, it is one of the best Charles Dickens adaptations out there.
Great Expectations is available to stream on Peacock in the U.S.
Cast
Claire Rushbrook
, Mark Addy
, Douglas Booth
, Oscar Kennedy
, Vanessa Kirby
, Gillian Anderson
, Ray Winstone
, David Suchet
, Shaun Dooley
, Jack Roth
, Charlie Creed-Miles
, Mary Roscoe
, Izzy Meikle-Small
, Andrew Bone
, Eros Vlahos
, Steve Lately
, Susan Lynch
, Frances Barber
, Will Tudor
, Dave Legeno
, Michael Colgan
, Abigail Bond
, Paul Rhys
, Paul Ritter
, Harry Lloyd
Image via BBC
Image via BBC
English (US) ·