15 Comments

I too have loved the film for many years.

What you may not know is that the underlying story is a true one based on the life of Stoney Bowes, who barged his way into the Bowes-Lyon family when he encountered Mary, the widowed heiress and tricked her into marrying him.

He abused her and kidnapped her on horseback when she tried to escape from the marriage. The whole story took place in and around Gibside, an estate near Newcastle which is open to the public.

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I’ve avoided the film for some reason. Perhaps I’m rarely in the mood for coldness. Your analysis intrigues me though, I plan to watch as soon as possible. Thank you!

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Great commentary on one of my all time favorite films. Another filmmaker I love is Mike Leigh whose slow moving meditations on human frailty are entertaining to me in the way that Batman movies are to most movie watchers. This one, like all Kubrick films, has that signature terrifying drone of unspoken, unsettling violence throughout.

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If you're intrigued by the actual Stoney Bowes story, you might get a copy of "Wedlock" by Wendy Moore

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I love this movie. Subtle, precise in its movements, gorgeous. The most Kurosawa a Kubrick film can be. It’s a litmus test for me on where you are on the cool artsy person spectrum 😂 it’s def a required taste. As close to the reality of life as any movie can be.

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Very entertaining and I love Barry Lyndon and return to it often as the adventure of the tufty shaggy sided road and the posh parlour parries are so beguiling, as are Barry's many hopelessnesses. Also the music is just brilliant and Marissa Berenson's make up and negligees..and..and..and.. xxx

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I don't recall that much about the film -- but the soundtrack is awesome. Pull it up on Spotify (or whatever) sometime.

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Check out David Lean who years later realised his women in Dr Zhivago were wearing 1960s beehive hairdos! I need to see BL again now...

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Thank you. A wonderful observation of a great film.

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I watched this film 10 years ago, with my then 15-year-old son, 30 minutes a night, in the back of our Westfalia during a roadtrip along the south shore of the majestic St. Lawrence River, where the first French and English settlers landed around the same time. My son and I loved the film. You've made me want to see it again!

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I've watched Barry Lyndon five or six times over the years. I loved it.

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You nailed it, Johnny Desserts!

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Thanks!

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I've said this countless of times on Twitter and Reddit to film professors and armchair Letterboxd critics, this, upon the first viewing of the film on a rented DVD set from a public library in 2011.

And, here, you can use this one, too:

Barry Lyndon is the better gangster film sandwiched between both Godfathers.

This article sheds no new light except to the uninformed.

Holla at me!

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I have a copy of Barry Lyndon, the ONLY Kubrick I have never watched the whole way through. I just can't. I've tried, more than once, and perhaps it is simply not in my makeup to love it and see it repeatedly as I have many of his other films. I even learned to appreciate Eyes Wide Open in a way I probably never will Barry Bore-don.

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