The classic Ibsen play Hedda Gabler has been adapted to film multiple times after its theater premiere in 1891 for good reason. It is a great story of a woman with aspirations in a society with no place for her except as wife and mother and pretty fixture on her husband’s arm. Writer/director Nia DaCosta’s latest film updates the story to the 1950s, but the central point is still apt. Hedda (Tessa Thompson) is the proverbial bird in the gilded cage. Married to somewhat boring academic George (Tom Bateman) and living in a sumptuous mansion in the English countryside that he bought to woo her, she doesn’t want to accept the subservient role in the patriarchal society she’s stuck in.
The story takes place over an evening where Hedda throws a lavish party, partly to ensure her husband makes a good enough impression on a particular professor to secure the job he needs to get out of debt. But the arrival of her newly sober ex-lover Eileen Lovborg (Nina Hoss) throws a whole lot of spice into the evening. Eileen is also vying for the position that Hedda’s husband wants so badly. And added to the mix is Eileen’s current lover Thea (Imogen Poots), who Hedda is not too thrilled about welcoming, as she is also Eileen’s co-author on a new book, the only copy of which Eileen just happens to bring with her to the soiree.
What follows is Hedda’s non-stop manipulation of everyone in the house, and Eileen in particular. Her jealousy and cruelty guide her every move. Tessa Thompson is fierce and gorgeous, and brilliant. And Nina Hoss’s Eileen is her perfect sparing partner, commanding and equally ruthless. It is an intensely sensual pas de deux.
George expects a civilized affair, but that’s not how Hedda sees the evening. There is booze and a jazz band and as the night goes on anything could happen. We learn early on that Hedda is wearing a key around her neck that fits a box of guns she inherited from her father. And you can bet that those guns will come into the picture before the night is over.
The setting is gorgeous. The costumes, too. Thompson and Hoss are stellar in their roles. And the inventive script moves the story along at a good pace, too. It is a thrilling ride, well worth your time.
On Amazon Prime and in select theaters.