A Room With A View. Expansiveness is suggested even in the title of late British novelist E.M. Forster’s work. The title brings imaginings of romance, of possibility, of new beginnings. In the original story, young Englishwoman Lucy Honeychurch travels abroad chaperoned by her dotty older cousin Charlotte. Lucy meets a collection of personalities and experiences so strikingly new, it changes Lucy’s life and future.

Many first met Forster's story and characters in a 1985 cinema adaptation. The cinema version upheld the original story and was loyal to its underlying message: hope lies within, so follow your heart. It seems unfair to draw comparisons between this 2007 PBS Masterpiece Classic TV film version, and the 1985 Merchant-Ivory film; but one feels safe expecting some semblance of Forster’s original story.

Unfortunately, that expectation is dashed in this reworked retelling. Rather than the expansiveness of young love and a new beginning, rather than the imaginative tour of Tuscany and “the young girl transfigured” there, one is greeted with the limitations and fragmentations of memory, and a solemn procession through regret. Is this E.M. Forster’s intended story?

No, indeed. And before I begin to complain and explain, let me say I am not completely opposed to reworking great works of art. Shakespeare’s plays have been told in so many languages, modes of dress, and with so many viewpoints and emphases one cannot count the 're-visions'. Historical tales have also had dates, locations, and so forth fudged a bit in a storyline for expediency or entertainment's sake. One can forgive such stylistic changes, as long as the basic tale is unravaged.

I tried, but I just could not forgive what’s been done to Forster’s classic here. The film itself seems amateurish — badly cast, badly written, badly acted. Only the cinematography acquits itself; it accomplishes the hazy quality of memories long past, which this telling requires. The scriptwriter has employed a framing device in which the story’s heroine, Lucy, arrives at the same pensione where she met her husband years before. The film then jumps back and forth between her ‘current’ stay post-World War I, and her original stay in the same room ten years prior. I don’t normally mind a framing device; neither do I object to a story being told via flashbacks. It isn’t the method but the art (or lack) of it. Whichever device a work uses it should fit the story and have the desired emotional impact. In this case, the story itself is so fragmented as to be nearly impossible to follow; the desired emotional impact is a mystery. I feel fairly certain that confusion, frustration, and boredom were not among the emotional responses the filmmakers wished from their viewers.

E.M. Forster’s novel A Room with a View was thought to be the most hopeful and optimistic of all his works. It was also the most popular in its day. Who could not identify with Lucy, the young woman who 'found herself' in her first love and resisted the pressures of society and family to stay loyal to her own heart? In the novel's seemingly simple story, Forster slipped subtle signals to his reader to do the same — to thine own self be true. Lucy is rewarded in the novel and in the Merchant-Ivory film for following her heart above all else.