This is a review of a film called “An Ideal Husband” which was written by Oscar Wild. There are 5 main characters, which are Sir Robert, Lord Arthur, Mrs. Cheveley and Julianne Moore. They all have their own characteristics, for example, Robert is kind- hearted and Arthur is righteous. And the followings mainly focus on Mrs. Cheveley.
In the beginning, I’d like to introduce the film. The story is about the British upper classes. In the past, Sir Robert made a serious mistake, which was he stole a government secret and sold it to a business man. Now he holds an important government position. And Mrs. Cheveley wants to take advantage of this secret to make him support a political plan which can help her make money. However, Robert refused Mrs. Cheveley and his best friend Arthur helps him get out of the trouble. So it’s a happy ending.Robert’s wife Julianne Moore forgives Robert and they begin a new life.
Then I’m going to analyze Mrs. Cheveley in the following four parts. Three are about her shortcomings and one is about her good quality. On the one hand, she is a woman who is lured by profits, is good at making mischief, and is dare to do anything in order to achieve her aim. And on the other hand, she is a woman who is good at talking and getting along with men
Firstly, as far as I am concerned, Mrs. Cheveley is lured by profits and she is too crazy about earning money. In order to protect the money she devoted to the canal business, she tried too many ways, such as threatening Robert and seducing Arthur. So this point shows Mrs. Cheveley is the kind of woman who regards money as a very important thing. And there is another point can prove my view. In the novel, the last marriage of Mrs. Cheveley was also about money and reputation. In order to marry a government officer, she even lived in Vienna. In this way, the two points can strongly prove that Mrs. Cheveley is the kind of woman who love money even more than anything else in the world.
As for the second characteristic, I want to mainly talk about Mrs. Cheveley’s scheming mind. She is so good at making mischief. In the whole story, she provokes relationship of two groups of characters. One is Robert and his wife Julianne Moore, and the other is Robert and Arthur.
As for the first group of characters, Mrs. Cheveley let Robert’s wife know his ugly secret on purpose, and then takes advantage of his wife’s anger to make Robert agree to help her.
And as for the second group, the appearance of Mrs. Cheveley successfully destroys the friendship between Robert and Arthur. Her every action is in her plan and is quite beneficial to her. Even though Mrs. Cheveley is a bad person, I do think she is like a queen to control every section and even every character’s mood. Undoubtedly, Mrs. Cheveley is a very clever person, but at the same time, she is too scheming.
Thirdly, in my opinion, Mrs. Cheveley can do anything and pay any cost in order to achieve her aim. For instance, in order to protect the money, she threaten Robert to force him help her, which violates morality.
And in order to make Arthur help her, she even asks the marriage for him. And from these two examples, I can see that Mrs. Cheveley does not regard marriage as a holy thing at all. Her marriage is full of interests, and she only wants to take full advantage of marriage to make herself become richer and richer. And this point of view coordinates the first point in some way, from her view of love, I think she loves money more than herself.
Last but not the least, as the saying goes, “every coin has two sides.” Mrs. Cheveley also has a advantage.
She is good at getting along with men. That’s why so many men fall in love with her. And also, she is good at talking with others. That’s why she can fawn on the upper class and get the power.
Actually, the hypocritical behaviors and secular values don’t only belong to Mrs. Cheveley. At that time, Britain was so boastful that no one was dare to talk with others sincerely, especially for the upper class. All men were chasing for fortune and reputation just like Mrs. Cheveley, and there were no friendship and pure love at all. So the author Oscar Wild created Mrs. Cheveley to satirize the hypocritical emotions. And also, he wanted to reveal the dirty environment of British government. The relationships between government officers were full of interests. And at that time, money could get absolute power and money was everything.
All in all, even though Mrs. Cheveley has a few advantages, she still is a bad character. In order to gain money and reputation, she hurts too many people and even sells her love. The biggest value of Mrs. Cheveley in the story is to reveal and satire the dark and dirty political environment in Britain. By the way, I wrote this analysis of her is because from all novels I have read, she is the only character that I hate so deeply.
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