(2007) In this double-segmented BBC production (directed by James Hawes from Andrew Davies's screenplay adaptation of John Cleland's bawdy 18th-century novel), Fanny Hill (Rebecca Night), originally an innocent maid - the orphaned, pretty, and only child of poor but honest parents, victims of small pox, from a little village in Lancashire - narrates how she became a high-priced courtesan in London ("Our virtues and our vices depend too much on our circumstances") before being reunited with her one true love, Charles Standing (Alex Robertson), in her lubricous autobiography: "My own true story."

While the film contains much nudity, including couples humping and pumping in bedrooms and bordellos, nevertheless the sex like Fanny's cultivated language ("I guided it into my palpitating and pleasure-thirsty channel") is sophisticated in its passion and soft in its eromania (though American audiences won't be seeing this program on their PBS Masterpiece Classics anytime soon) in comparison with the rough, rude reality.

Deceived by her childhood friend Esther Davies (Emma Stansfield) into seeking her fortune in the city where she's introduced to Mrs Brown (Alison Steadman), becoming one of the madam's "nieces," passively unprepossessing Fanny receives from her kind and gentle bedmate Phoebe ministrations that awaken her erogenous excitement and instructions for her duties in the gentlemen's club.

Mrs Brown presents Fanny to her first "cousin" as client, Mr Crofts, elderly and foul-breathed, by stating that the country girl is "innocent as the day she was born. That's guaranteed, warranted, signed, and sealed, sir, the genuine article. And below you will find she's as tight as the Chatsworth lock on the national safe deposit." Unable to penetrate the keyhole into her treasure against her unwillingness to submit, Mr Crofts departs in a terrible state of anger and frustration.

Still possessing her maidenhead, she makes acquaintance with Mr H (Hugo Speer), who advises her of the wickedness of her environment, and then Charles, a handsome youthful son of a merchant upon whom he depends for a modest allowance, who falls in love with her at first sight: "Fanny, will you trust me and come away with me?" Fleeing Mrs Brown's establishment with her brave gallant, she pretends to be his wife in Mrs Jones's boardinghouse.

"Well, and what was your first time like … a paradise of sensual delight?" asks the more-knowledgeable narrator: "No. I didn't think so …" Afterward for three days and nights the lovers never left their room.

In a millinery shop where Charles buys her new clothing, Fanny again meets Esther, who introduces her to Mrs Coles (Samantha Bond). Proposing marriage to Fanny as Mrs Jones (Ruth Sheen) presses him for rent, Charles proudly brings her before his father for permission to wed only to hear the patriarch thunder: "She's a whore!"

From here it's pretty much downhill for Fanny, who's pregnant. Charles's father forcibly sends him off to the West Indies on family business; penniless with bills, she loses the baby and faces either the bleak prospects of debtors' prison or having Mrs Jones as her new bawd. Fortunately, the wealthy Mr H, brother of an earl, comes to her rescue, paying off her debts and setting her up as his mistress with the only proviso that she entertain no other lovers.

In addition to the arts of love, he teaches her poetry, history, music, and gentle speech toward her becoming a fine lady of society. As the owner of her body, he makes little progress at capturing her heart. Though she finds the arrangement secure, protective, and highly satisfying, she makes the mistake of extracting revenge for his taking liberties with a chambermaid (not so much out of jealousy as out of pique for his spite); he reluctantly casts her out onto the streets.

"Spoiled and pampered," unable to return to her former state of being "poor and honest," Fanny returns to Esther and Mrs Coles's millinery (a front for a house of joy) where her career takes off "as a vehicle for hire" (though a gilt carriage that can only be had for a hefty price) with young Percival Harding (whose father brings him in for an initiation into manhood with what he thinks is a virginal country lass, letting nature take its course) as well as the father (weekly appointments); Mr Norbert, fragile of health, paying a £1000 to live among Mrs Coles's girls for company and conversation, until asking Fanny ("You remind me of my lost love") for her favors ("dart of a dead man lodged inside me"); and once more Mr H ("Come back to me").

Yet again Mr H is responsible for making her "a creature of the street," from which she's rescued after doing an aged man, Mr Goodyear, a good turn; when he dies he leaves his housekeeper Fanny his inheritance.

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Copyright © 2009 Patrick Ivers. All rights reserved.
Reproduced with the permission of the copyright holder.

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