“A Quiet Passion,” December 8, 2017 (2017), DVD, home. Cynthia Nixon is remarkable (Oscar nomination-worthy) in this fictionalized biopic about the life of Emily Dickinson written and directed by Terrence Davies He consciously blends fictional narrative with fact to construct his vision of Dickinson, the great 19th Century American poetess who worked and dwelt in total obscurity in her family’s manse in Amherst, Ma She rarely left her home, and eventually became a recluse She foreswore marital ties…and perhaps all physical contact with men and women, although much is unclear and speculation abounds This is, as I mentioned, a fictionalized narrative Davies has her both brilliant and torn between the isolation that allows her the freedom to work, and the lack of recognition and renown she desperately craves She disparages men and marriage, pushing away those who admire her and living in isolated passion for those she cannot have She accepts religion and spirituality even as she rejects the self-righteous purity of the ‘saved’ She both craves and is appalled by passion and the ‘impurity’ of others She both rejects her family’s and especially her father’s (David Carradine) Puritanism Her world is the overstuffed home of the town gentry of Amherst She both apes and rejects the irrelevance of bourgeois life as drawn by the Brontes, proving her brilliance in boring and superficial critiques of those around her She could, Davies has her, be loving and humble and incredibly bitter, cruel and self-righteous She is also in immense pain, suffering terrifying seizures, horrific, disabling back pain and joint swelling, all of which Davies attributes to Bright’s Disease, the name used in the 19th c to cover acute and chronic nephritis She writes and writes and writes her spare, pre-modernist verse that attempts to extract truth The film has not been universally well received by the viewing public, including Bronwen, and I suspect part of that is because it is often slow, dark, and silent The language is very studied I found that a perfect presentation of the oppressive home that shaped both her intellect and her self-imposed isolation The slowness really worked for me, as did the remarkable sets (it was filmed in Belguim!) that recreated the Homestead I must admit, however, I missed any suggestion of a New England accent in the cast Excellent features attached to the DVD including an interview conducted with Nixon.