Performance Profile: Helen Mirren in Gosford Park (2001)

In recent years, there have been a fair share of "favorite nominees" -- those ladies who have proven to be generally much more popular among the blogosphere and Oscar/film freaks in their respective years. These performances were either considered "robbed" of the award, or they just simply have a huge, devoted fan base...and in 2001 one nominee (more than the others) fits under this coveted "general favorites" category, -- one that Andrew has proudly proclaimed his love for, the favored performance given by....

...Helen Mirren in Gosford Park (2001)

Helen Mirren plays Mrs. Wilson, the sternly devoted head servant at Gosford Park who runs a tight-ship below the stairs where the maids/servants living quarters are located below the snooty, fancy living above.

Because of the weekend shooting party, you would think that everyone and everything would be a big messy feast of getting settled in and such, but under Mrs. Wilson's control everything is tidy and neatly organized from the smallest detail to the largest. Almost nothing gets passed this lady unnoticed, and she has a sort of respected reputation for getting the job done and done well as she is technically her own boss even though she isn't "the (wo)man of the house".

From her very first entrance in the film, as everyone else is running around in a tizzy and chattying it up, Mrs. Wilson maintains a introverted, coldly, closed off presence which visually of course makes her distinctive and disconnected from her grand surroundings. She's a no-nonsense and grounded force amid a chaotic web of all sorts of people with all sorts of neuroses...but Mrs. Wilson is not quite the cold, blank slate the other characters (as well as the audience) perceives. The first crack in her "perfect" existence comes from hearing a guests name and vaguely recognizing him in a way which rings quite a few bells, and sets off a subtlety tragic character arc to follow.

Suddenly something coincides and coheres with Mrs. Wilson's job. Something which she has desperately tried to bury under her selflessly devoted services. Something which she simply can no longer ignore, as it now stares her in the face in a way she never believed would happen. Mirren takes on the role with a intuitive understanding and devotion -- just as Mrs. Wilson's devotion is something due to a certain "choice" -- that in a way breaks down a complex individual so that her enigmatic behaviors can be understood a painfully, privately and personal level.     

Throughout the film, Mrs. Wilson carefully watches over and communicates more with a man named Parks, than she does anyone else, and it's because being the overly workaholic servant she is, Mrs. Wilson has a keen "secret" ability for observing and studying others with them even knowing it. She's not as simple as she looks, and through Mirren's meticulous performance we come closer and closer to comprehending just what is happening behind that tough-cookie mask she has so carefully sculpted.

But the actress, at every moment, in itty-bitty ways, conveys that there's so much happening to Mrs. Wilson even as she maintains her loyal duties -- artfully projecting her dark, cavernous inner life. But it's this man, this guest, that she has a "closer" relationship to; more than anybody has ever known. It's this hidden relationship which brings something out in Mrs. Wilson, and Mirren uses little words to express this interior life. Instead, opting to make use of her body, eyes, and face -- each capturing flickers of trapped emotion (like as Parks tells about his childhood at dinner, or Mrs. Wilson getting a glimpse at her old picture on his side table). One reviewer compared Mirren's performance to that of Lily Tomlin's triumphant achievement in Altman's Nashville, both take us in the lives and psyche of their deeply complex characters as they begin to to have life-chaning experiences. I couldn't agree more.

On second viewing it became clear to me that Mirren's character thread seems to skirt the edges of Gosford Park's tricky narrative, almost like a ominous, ghostly creature who symbolizes some kind of foreboding downfall. Orginally, I had kinda-sorta dismissed Mirren's performance as an empty, uninspired shell of false intention and action; alot of craftsmanship but with little merit. But I now see another something, which boasts my appreciation for this celebrated work.               

As the story continues it is revealed that Parks is indeed Mrs. Wilson's long lost son, whom she had put up for adoption when her pregnancy interfered with her factory working job for her employer now, William McCordle. When he is killed twice...the answers may be kind of there, but the reasoning is left up to Mirren's Wilson who, in a startlingly (and intentionally) withdrawn monologue, begins to let those tightly colied springs slowly undue. 

It becomes clear that it had been Mrs. Wilson who had murdered Sir William in a sad attempt to save the little family she has left. Being the perfect servant means that she thinks like no other, and knowing that her son had been planning on murdering his father for ruining his childhood, she beat him to it by slipping poison to the old crab. It's her way of "acting out" to protect her son from being thrown in prison and for getting a kind of revenge on the man who placed in her in a sad desperation. Mrs. Wilson says, "I'm the perfect servant, I have no life..." -- these perfectly delivered words hauntingly echo in the character's final scene. 

Everyone is going for good now, and all that's left is the staff, including Mrs. Croft who finds her sister crying in her room.

She sobs and lets all of that trapped emotion flow out, not caring who hears, because she can no longer keep it to herself. Here, Mirren vividly and richly communicates a lifetime of pain and regret that had been bubbling to the top for years.

She now fully realizes her mistake of sacrificing her child for a job in which she seems to be forever stuck in...she has no life, and now she knows that she has lost a son, a family, a happy life she can never have back because of the choices she has made. It's haunting, deeply moving and rings true, and not just because of Mirren's gift of conveying the feelings, but because of the emotional architecture she had every so slowly built throughout her characterization. Crisp, efficient underplaying which culminates in this heartbreaking coda.

In a film which feels so emotionally shallow, Mirren's performance, which was once at the edges, has glided into the center; providing Gosford Park with an emotional core and heart which resonates in a way the rest have not.

For me, Helen Mirren's richly affecting work is in fact worth the hype and praise those fans, such as Andrew, had rightfully adorned her with, and her performance is a nearly diamond-perfect example of an performer channelling their actorly talent into fully rounded and fully effective service to their character.