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Orlando

 Orlando
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TVTItem
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Orlando
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Orlando
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A 1992 film, written and directed by Sally Potter, based on the novel by Virginia Woolf, and chiefly notable for being the movie which made Tilda Swinton into a star.The film is set between the Elizabethan era and the present day, and follows the career of the title character, played by Swinton, who starts out as a handsome and somewhat androgynous young nobleman. Orlando's beauty gets the attention of the elderly Elizabeth I, who grants him a big house and lots of land on the condition that he doesn't grow old...which Orlando proceeds not to do. He is, however, unlucky in love, falling for a Russian princess who jilts him. By the 17th century, Orlando is as young as ever and is interested in becoming a writer. He shows his verse to cynical poet Nick Greene, who in return suggests that if only Orlando were to set him up with a financial stipend, he could devote himself to being a full-time writer. Greene reads Orlando's poetry and finds it terrible, and publishes a poem ridiculing Orlando. Orlando is humiliated, but tells his people to pay Greene the stipend anyway.By the 18th century, Orlando is a diplomat who has travelled to Constantinople as the English ambassador. While he's there, he gets caught up in a battle. The next morning, he wakes up in his bed to discover that he's turned into a woman, and is fine with that. Orlando travels back to England to find that her new sex raises a lot of questions about who's going to inherit the house if she's not married, because obviously, she can't; she is also now patronised by the intelligentsia. The film moves on to the 19th century, when a dashing American chap named Shelmerdine (Billy Zane) falls off his horse on Orlando's lawn, breaking his ankle. She takes him in and cares for him, and has her first (and only) satisfying love affair.We see Orlando as a pregnant nurse, stumbling across a World War One battlefield, and then in the present day, Orlando is a single mother and author, shopping the manuscript of her life story to a publisher (played by the same actor who played Nick Greene). He's interested, this time.Since the most famous thing about this film is that its title character changes sex, spoilers are unmarked!
 Orlando
fetched
2023-05-24T12:58:26Z
 Orlando
parsed
2023-05-24T12:58:26Z
 Orlando
isPartOf
DBTropes
 Orlando / int_1b70ccc6
type
The Cynic
 Orlando / int_1b70ccc6
comment
The Cynic: Nick Greene, who wants Orlando's patronage but sees no reason why he should even pretend to be grateful for it. Orlando seems to agree.
 Orlando / int_1b70ccc6
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1.0
 Orlando / int_1b70ccc6
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Orlando / int_1b70ccc6
 Orlando / int_1ddc03c1
type
Breaking Bad News Gently
 Orlando / int_1ddc03c1
comment
Breaking Bad News Gently: Orlando turns down the Archduke's hand in marriage this way.
 Orlando / int_1ddc03c1
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1.0
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Orlando / int_1ddc03c1
 Orlando / int_1e7487cd
type
Breaking the Fourth Wall
 Orlando / int_1e7487cd
comment
Breaking the Fourth Wall: Orlando does this a lot.
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1.0
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 Orlando
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Orlando / int_1e7487cd
 Orlando / int_2d88e42c
type
Gender Bender
 Orlando / int_2d88e42c
comment
Gender Bender: Orlando changes from a man to a woman halfway through the film.
 Orlando / int_2d88e42c
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1.0
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Orlando / int_2d88e42c
 Orlando / int_30de7a51
type
Chivalrous Pervert
 Orlando / int_30de7a51
comment
Chivalrous Pervert: Male!Orlando in the 1500s, who's engaged to a nice girl but who falls for a Russian princess.
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1.0
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Orlando / int_30de7a51
 Orlando / int_3b113b7
type
Character Development
 Orlando / int_3b113b7
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Character Development: Male!Orlando tells Princess Sasha "You're mine", and when she asks why, he replies "Because I adore you." A couple of hundred years later, the Archduke uses the same line on Female!Orlando, and being on the recipient end of that love possessiveness, finally understands why it was such an awful idea.
 Orlando / int_3b113b7
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 Orlando / int_40cc0c7e
type
Bittersweet Ending
 Orlando / int_40cc0c7e
comment
Bittersweet Ending: Orlando has outlived everyone she's ever loved except for her daughter, and she's lost everything she ever had, but she's got a daughter, a motorbike, a potentially a saleable manuscript, and the knowledge that she represents a possible future for the human race.
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Orlando / int_40cc0c7e
 Orlando / int_415b3315
type
Stylistic Suck
 Orlando / int_415b3315
comment
Stylistic Suck: Orlando's poetry.
 Orlando / int_415b3315
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1.0
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Orlando / int_415b3315
 Orlando / int_506ffa51
type
Tears of Joy
 Orlando / int_506ffa51
comment
Tears of Joy: Orlando has these at the end of the film, watching her daughter run through the grass and listening to the angel hovering above the tree singing to her. Coupled with Dissonant Serenity:
 Orlando / int_506ffa51
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Orlando / int_506ffa51
 Orlando / int_598ad6e2
type
Even the Guys Want Him
 Orlando / int_598ad6e2
comment
Even the Guys Want Him: Male!Orlando, as we find out after the change, when the Archduke admits that he's been admiring Orlando since well before the change.
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1.0
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Orlando / int_598ad6e2
 Orlando / int_5f146203
type
Dissonant Serenity
 Orlando / int_5f146203
comment
Dissonant Serenity: After a lifetime of disappointments, humiliations, abandonments, her inheritance long since taken away, and everyone she has ever been fond of (except for her daughter) dying on her, the final shot of the film is Orlando smiling mysteriously into the camera with an unblinking stare for twenty-two seconds. Strangely uplifting, because who wouldn't want Tilda Swinton smiling at them for 22 seconds.
 Orlando / int_5f146203
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Orlando / int_5f146203
 Orlando / int_63be4131
type
Pretty Boy
 Orlando / int_63be4131
comment
Pretty Boy: Orlando is a youthful pretty boy in the first half of the film, accentuated by his fashionably long hair (and underlined by the fact that he's played by Tilda Swinton).
 Orlando / int_63be4131
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1.0
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1.0
 Orlando
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Orlando / int_63be4131
 Orlando / int_6a6b23ff
type
Unfazed Everyman
 Orlando / int_6a6b23ff
comment
Unfazed Everyperson: The weird things that happen to Orlando (never getting old, changing from man to woman) never startle or surprise him/her; he/she only gets upset when someone dumps, insults, harries or otherwise mistreats him/her.
 Orlando / int_6a6b23ff
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1.0
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Orlando / int_6a6b23ff
 Orlando / int_6b2b3b59
type
The Reveal
 Orlando / int_6b2b3b59
comment
The Reveal: The mirror scene. Orlando wakes up in wig and shirt and lies there for a moment, staring into space, then takes the wig off and leaves. The shirt falls on the bed. Orlando goes to the washstand, washes face, then pauses, and looks off. Cut to naked Orlando looking at Orlando's reflection in a full-length mirror: she now has a woman's body. She stares at herself for a long moment.
 Orlando / int_6b2b3b59
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1.0
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Orlando / int_6b2b3b59
 Orlando / int_7ffca8c4
type
Immortality Begins at Twenty
 Orlando / int_7ffca8c4
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Immortality Begins at Twenty: It does for Orlando, anyway, who over the course of 400 calendar years, ages by about ten years (Tilda Swinton was 31 when the film was made.)
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1.0
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1.0
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 Orlando / int_985d3ad0
type
Cross-Cast Role
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Crosscast Role: Orlando himself, at least until the physical transition. Elizabeth I is additionally played by trans woman author, raconteuse and LGBT icon Quentin Crisp, who at the time was unaware of being transgender (in fact, Crisp didn't come out until shortly before dying at age 90) and was cast as a male actor.
 Orlando / int_985d3ad0
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 Orlando / int_a82ff02f
type
Meet Cute
 Orlando / int_a82ff02f
comment
Meet Cute: Orlando and Shelmerdine:
 Orlando / int_a82ff02f
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1.0
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Orlando / int_a82ff02f
 Orlando / int_abc28948
type
Straw Misogynist
 Orlando / int_abc28948
comment
Straw Misogynist: Pope. Downplayed in that Pope doesn't actively hate women, he just has zero respect for them. Also Justified, as this is Truth in Television.note cf. Pope's ''Moral Essays'', Epistle II: Of the Characters of Women
 Orlando / int_abc28948
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 Orlando
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Orlando / int_abc28948
 Orlando / int_b032e4ed
type
Ms. Fanservice
 Orlando / int_b032e4ed
comment
Ms. Fanservice: When female Orlando looks at herself in the mirror after the transformation.
 Orlando / int_b032e4ed
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1.0
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 Orlando
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Orlando / int_b032e4ed
 Orlando / int_b59e09cd
type
Bifauxnen
 Orlando / int_b59e09cd
comment
Bifauxnen: Orlando at the end of the film, in her boots, jodhpurs, waistcoat and shirt; she has a ponytail but she holds herself very upright.
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Orlando / int_b59e09cd
 Orlando / int_b5b4b077
type
The Ace
 Orlando / int_b5b4b077
comment
The Ace: Shelmerdine.
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 Orlando
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Orlando / int_b5b4b077
 Orlando / int_bb0c0a4d
type
Fiery Redhead
 Orlando / int_bb0c0a4d
comment
Fiery Redhead: Inverted. Orlando has red hair but is generally very calm and seldom gets angry or upset.
 Orlando / int_bb0c0a4d
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1.0
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Orlando / int_bb0c0a4d
 Orlando / int_c4b0faae
type
Can't Hold His Liquor
 Orlando / int_c4b0faae
comment
Can't Hold His Liquor: Downplayed with Orlando, who when exchanging toasts with The Khan in the blazing sun, manages to last for about three drinks before sinking to his knees.
 Orlando / int_c4b0faae
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1.0
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 Orlando
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Orlando / int_c4b0faae
 Orlando / int_c852ac43
type
Mars and Venus Gender Contrast
 Orlando / int_c852ac43
comment
Mars and Venus Gender Contrast: By the 1700s Orlando has come to believe this:
 Orlando / int_c852ac43
featureApplicability
1.0
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1.0
 Orlando
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Orlando / int_c852ac43
 Orlando / int_d7700808
type
Living Forever is No Big Deal
 Orlando / int_d7700808
comment
Living Forever is No Big Deal: Orlando barely even seems to notice their immortality, adapting to the changing eras without being overjoyed, overly depressed, or even mentioning the fact that they're still alive after all these centuries. The nearest Orlando gets to being inescapably miserable because of eternal life is when she loses her house to a legal catastrophe (being both female and legally dead), Shelmerdine leaves her to pursue freedom, and she's left to struggle alone through war and pregnancy during the early 20th century. And she bounces back from that, too!
 Orlando / int_d7700808
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Orlando / int_d7700808
 Orlando / int_e8e3807
type
Aside Glance
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comment
Aside Glance: Orlando does a lot of these, most amusingly at the end:
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Orlando / int_e8e3807
 Orlando / int_name
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Orlando

The following is a list of statements referring to the current page from other pages.

 Orlando
hasFeature
Awkward Poetry Reading / int_c3c5fb27
 Orlando
hasFeature
Films of 1990–1994 / int_c3c5fb27