• Maurice

3/27/26 (Fri)

EM Forster’s book, considered a minor work in his oeuvre, was given a terrific adaptation by James Ivory in 1987. The novel was conceived in 1913 but not published until 1971, a year after the author’s death, due to his concern over the gay content. Ivory, who is himself gay, unexpectedly chose this after the success of his first Forster adaptation, the wonderful A Room with a View. While the gay aspect sets the film apart for its time, the question of identity extends as well to class, the perennial subject of the British arts, which makes it more complex.

After a brief prelude where Wilby’s teacher tries clumsily to enlighten the boy, who has no father or male models, on puberty and sex, we skip a few years further to university. James Wilby (as Maurice) becomes acquainted with Clive (Hugh Grant) through a mutual aristocratic friend. Grant is gay at heart but, tied too tightly to conventional dreams of status, thinks he’ll be happier with the trappings of high life – wealth, social position, political future – than with something as amorphous as love. That is even more so when his friend and classmate is arrested and sentenced to hard labor for soliciting male sex, homosexuality being outlawed in the UK at that time. Though Grant is the one who approached Wilby, he insists on keeping things non-sexual when Wilby responds (“The sole excuse for a relationship between two men is that it remains purely platonic”). He seems very Japanese in his ability to suppress his desires for what society thinks is best. As a psychiatrist tells Wilby, “England has always been disinclined to accept human nature.”

Wilby, however, is more willing to take chances and at least question his feelings. He skips class even after running into the teacher, knowing that he’ll be kicked out. He shrugs it off and decides he doesn’t need school to get a job in the City. He can’t shake off his feelings for Maurice and visits the latter’s palatial home after his marriage, but only becomes more confused. He tries to confide in the family physician, who dismisses the idea angrily, then goes to an American hypnotist, who tells him at first to go to France or Italy where gay sex is legal.

In the meantime, Alec (Rupert Graves), a gamekeeper at Grant’s home, takes an interest in Wilby, who barely notices him. Graves senses Wilby’s interest in men. He climbs a ladder to Wilby’s room and has sex with him. He becomes obsessed and wants Wilby to visit him, then becomes furious when that doesn’t happen. Wilby faces a double-whammy, having to confront both his gay identity and upper-class identity. Rather surprisingly, all ends happily as Wilby and Graves pledge to build a life together, while Grant, now married and well into a typical career, looks wistfully out his window reminiscing about what might have been.

The story has holes in places. Grant’s emotional outpouring of love for Wilby was curious given his reluctance to follow through and his buttoned-up conservatism. And whether the upper-class Wilby can really make a life with the lower-class Graves on the basis of a few good nights of sex is unclear. I wondered what kind of life they’re going to have. Graves threatens to expose Wilby after he failed to come to the boathouse, even though Wilby never made any promise of such. That seems a bad omen.

Nevertheless, the film is a sensitive portrayal of Wilby’s coming-to-terms with his sexuality without the usual stereotypes. The three character types represented by the main trio were credible, a good examination of the issue from all sides, though the happy ending does push things a bit as presented here. Still, the dialogue was realistic and unshowy, the characters believable, the acting spot on. The story, as noted, has its problems, but the easygoing rollout was a pleasure. While the Oscar Wilde-type who gets arrested was rather phony with his attempted bon mots (“Music is the highest of the arts. It needs no reference to the figurative, or the corporeal. It is therefore, of all the arts, the closest to death”), that’s after all his character. Ivory throws in some full frontal nudity in the locker room and bedroom, but on the whole is quite restrained in his portrayal of the high life. The film benefited from terrific camerawork, especially the gorgeous shots of the countryside and Cambridge.

The cast is brilliant all around. James Wilby is fantastic as the conflicted title character (which I learned is pronounced Morris), and Hugh Grant and Rupert Graves couldn’t be better. Wilby and Grant jointly won Best Actor and Ivory won Best Director in Venice, but were unjustly ignored thereafter. Among the best of this director’s works. Strongly recommended.