I saw this movie again last night on video, having seen it before. It's one of those unpretentious films that leaves you wondering why you are - quietly - so involved: it "sneaks up" on you. Musing, it occurred to me that the unnamed force holding the story together is the unidentified motivation of John Brown. Why does he become so doggedly concerned with the welfare of this woman - in both her manners and her position the epitome of that English system of class and values he so disdains - even to the point of near obsession? We can see from his other actions and words that it has something to do with responsibility, independence, kindness, strength and weakness, and most of all honesty - he cannot dissemble - but fortunately, the film makers and the actor don't pry. The character is that wonderful thing, opaque yet real, sympathetic yet independent and never cloying - a wonderful antidote to run of the mill characterisation where we, the audience, are forced relentlessly to "relate". You really feel as if you have met a man as you might in life. At the largest level, I got out of the film the sense of what is possible - in terms of feeling, of relationship, of kindness to others - to a person when they truly accept themselves and live life on their own terms.
