Cider House Rules--not!, The

When The Cider House Rules came out this year, you wouldn't have had an inkling, from the print ads or previews, that it was a film about abortion-- unless, of course, you were familiar with John Irving's 1985 novel of the same name. Indeed, a non-controversial, even "stealth" marketing strategy was a deliberate calculation on the part of Irving and the film's producers, Miramax. The movie was promoted as an uplifting, all-American film about first love and adorable children (it takes place in an orphanage). Once the lights went down, however, audiences were treated to a fractured morality tale with the abortionist as hero.

The film was nominated for seven Academy Awards, and won two: Best Supporting Actor, for Michael Caine, and Best Screenplay Adaptation for Irving, who exposed the film's true purpose when, on Oscar night, he thanked the National Abortion Rights Action League and Planned Parenthood for their support. (Planned Parenthood held special screenings and discussion groups around the country to celebrate the film and "educate" viewers.)

Well, they've found a way to market it; the least we can do is expose Cider House for what it truly is: abortion propaganda. We begin with The Cider House Rots, a penetrating review of the movie by Chris Weinkopf, who writes that the "breathtakingly beautiful" scenes and "precious foundlings" give the film "the look of a Norman Rockwell painting," with the purpose of beguiling the audience into embracing the film's defense of abortion.

In Abortion as Sacramental Moment?, Father Paul McNellis speculates about why it took so long for the novel to become what he calls a "cynical and pernicious" film: Irving "had to wait for his audience to catch up to him. That we have done so is testimony not to his courage or foresight, but to our own corruption." A dissection of Michael Caine's Oscar acceptance speech by William F. Buckley, Jr. which follows further elucidates "our" corruption.

Finally, we went back to our archives and found a review of the then bestselling novel, written for us by Steven Mosher (Fall, 1985). Mosher's extensive plot summary reveals how much Irving cleaned up, sanitized, and dulled his own story to create a screenplay that would garner an acceptable (PG-13!) rating, while still promoting his original message that--in teenage parlance-- abortion rules. Reading Mosher 15 years later supports Father McNellis' point that American culture had to catch up to Irving. Mosher thought Irving's message so "overblown" it would turn off even abortion sympathizers. Today, audiences seem willing to accept Irving's bloody advocacy, even after being duped into seeing the film in the first place.

-MARIA McFADDEN

EDITOR

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