Prismark10 John Ruskin a famed social thinker, reformer, art critic and painter has his character thrashed in this film. Ruskin when he was 29 years old married Effie Gray (Dakota Fanning) who was 19 years old. Not that great an age difference but clearly Greg Wise as John Ruskin looks too old and sadly too one note, then again his wife Emma Thompson wrote the screenplay and also plays a supporting role as Lady Eastlake.We are given very little to go on as to why Ruskin would not consummate the marriage, after all Effie is pretty which means either he was turned off by the female body or was homosexual. It probably did not help that Ruskin chose to live with his parents who seemed to have a heavy influence on the adult Ruskin.Ruskin also encourages his wife to have a developing relationship with his art protégé Everett Millais (Tom Sturridge) even if Millais at one point tells Ruskin how this would look to polite society.The film does not tell you that after the annulment, Effie married Millais and Ruskin never married again.This is a handsomely mounted leisurely paced film, there is some location filming in Venice but it is rather dreary, inert and conventional.Wise and Sturridge are not the strongest actors. Fanning though is rather good, Derek Jacobi and James Fox are rather wasted in their cameos.

gradyharp EFFIE GRAY was strangely overlooked by the public despite a sterling cast enacting Emma Thompson's screenplay re-enacting the lives of the Victorians John Ruskin and is failed marriage to Effie Gray and the entry of romance between Effie and the brilliant Pre- Raphaelite painter John Everett Millais. Perhaps the primary flaw in this little beautifully photographed period piece is Director Richard Laxton's sluggish pacing of the film – It does drag on forever, unnecessarily. (Laxton's other films include Burton and Taylor, River, and An Englishman in New York.)The basis of the film is a true Victorian scandal of Effie Gray being the first woman to divorce her husband. In 1848 the 29-year-old art and architecture critic, author and painter John Ruskin (Greg Wise) married Euphemia 'Effie' Gray (Dakota Fanning), the beautiful 19-year-old daughter of family friends. After six increasingly unhappy years, Effie fell in love with her husband's protégé the famous Pre-Raphaelite painter John Everett Millais (Tom Sturridge) and set about having the marriage annulled. What reverberated then and now was that the reason given for ending the union was non- consummation. But what really snagged in the public consciousness was Ruskin's explanation of why he didn't fulfill his marital duties (was he gay, simply repulsed by the fact that Effie has pubic hair unlike the classical female figures of art, etc – questions that have not been answered). Effie struggles with John's overbearing parents (Julie Walters and David Suchet), found solace with the prominent Eastlakes (Emma Thompson and James Fox), a doctor (Robbie Coltrane), and one Travers Twist (Derek Jacobi).The story is interesting, the characterizations excellent, the sets and scenery and costumes brilliant, and for a period piece this film is excellent. Audiences these days are simply more mature than to be 'shielded' form the facts of an unconsummated marriage and more emphasis could have been given to the fact the Effie was an early women's rights activist.

kenpery In some of the worst writing and directing I've ever seen, an hour and a half is spent telling a five minute story! Make no mistake, there is no love triangle exhibited here, no love making at all and no affair. The summary of the story given is a lie. I am big Dakota Fanning fan, which is why I chose this movie but I couldn't be more disappointed. It was very difficult not to stop watching mid way through. Emma Thompson is an actor of legendary caliber, but this screenplay is attributed to her and it is absolutely terrible! Everyone involved in the making of this film should be ashamed! I tried very hard to find some redeeming value in this film, but there is none.

ThurzdayNext This is a film treated with the delicacy that the real circumstances must have required. Effie Gray, based on the true story of a teenager who marries John Ruskin (grown man and well-known author), comes to realize that she and her husband have varying expectations of marriage. She slowly begins to fade away as she makes all appearances of following the rules of her new, married life.The movie is well-paced, quiet, and stylistically appropriate. Dakota Fanning does a wonderful job of portraying Effie's quiet despair, and you do forget that she is an American actor (her accent is good). Derek Jacobi makes a guest turn, towards the end, and, It's always a pleasure to see Emma Thompson in anything, let alone in a vehicle for a screenplay that she has written.Well worth seeing.