Maurice

1987 Drama

Director James Ivory brings his subdued, "Masterpiece Theater" style to a forbidden subject -- homosexual love. Maurice is based on E.M. Forster's suppressed 1914 novel that was held back from publication until after his death. The film takes place at Cambridge, before World War I, when homosexuality was outlawed in Great Britain. Clive (Hugh Grant), an aristocratic Englishman with a life of privilege, suddenly shocks his close friend Maurice (James Wilby) by declaring his love for him. Maurice is initially stunned by the pronouncement, but in the end finds himself giving Clive a passionate kiss and telling him that he loves him as well. Clive, in the stiff-upper-lip British manner, considers their love to be more of an intellectual concept, but Maurice becomes passionate about the affair. Clive, afraid of being exposed as a homosexual, backs off and breaks up with Maurice for marriage, family, and politics. Maurice is crestfallen, but then he has a passionate affair with Clive's gamekeeper, Scudder (Rupert Graves), and Maurice and Scudder decide to risk their reputations by openly living together as lovers. more..

Director: James Ivory

Starring: James Wilby, Hugh Grant, Rupert Graves, Denholm Elliott,Simon Callow

 16 Reviews  2 Awards

Reviews

  • To director James Ivory's credit, however, he has recreated that period in pre-World War I England and endowed the platonic passion between two upper-class Englishmen with singular grace in Maurice.

    - The San Francisco Chronicle

    26 April 2013

  • Mr. Ivory and Ismail Merchant have long since learned to breathe life into their material without excessive reverence, in a manner that is as decorous as it is dramatic. As might be expected, the costumes, settings and cinematography are once again ravishing.

    Janet Maslin - The New York Times

    26 April 2013

  • The team of producer Ismail Merchant and director James Ivory has created another classy film of a classic novel with their stunning adaptation of E.M. Forster's Maurice.

    - The Boston Globe

    26 April 2013

  • Maurice's slow, agonized dawning of his true nature and its consequences are as beautifully evoked on the screen as it is on the printed page, thanks to James Wilby's wonderfully unaffected portrayal of Maurice and to Ivory and his co-adapter Kit Hesketh-Harvey's graceful yet succinct script, a miracle of both apt selectivity and development that does full honor to its distinguished source.

    Kevin Thomas - Los Angeles Times

    26 April 2013

  • Maurice, based on a posthumously published novel by E.M. Forster, is a well-crafted pic on the theme of homosexuality.

    Justin Chang - Variety

    26 April 2013

Awards

  • Best Costume Design

    Academy Awards (1988)

     

  • Best Score

    Venice Film Festival (1987)

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