Gilded Age Movie Echoes In 2025
Happy New Year!
As the United States in 2025 solidifies its position in a new Gilded Age, the riveting 2015 British movie “An Inspector Calls” illuminates moral blindness. Written by J.B. Priestly (1894-1984) during the Great Depression, it illustrates the invisible role that social class plays in people’s lives and how we are all connected based on how we treat each other.
Set in 1912 in the home of the prominent and successful Birling family, a police inspector interrupts their evening of celebration to inform the family of a young woman’s suicide. One by one he interrogates this well-healed family to piece together the truth of Eva Smith’s unfortunate life and the roles they might have played in it.
Here’s an excerpt of “An Inspector Calls.”
The film, directed by Jason Farries, is a BBC production, and available on Amazon Prime, Britbox and other streaming services. Click.
The movie reminded me of this haunting yet memorable comic strip by New Zealand artist Toby Morris:
I need to watch, An Inspector Calls now. Wow! The editorial cartoon said so much.
You too, Bruce. We are in DC visiting the couple who introduced us back in 1988. Went to Filipino restaurant last night. Food was good, but it was too LOUD, says the old man. Then to a little party at one of Lucia's schoolmates relatives, in Adams Morgan neighborhood. To bed around 2.