Great Expectations (1998 film) Great Expectations (1998 film) Great Expectations is a 1998 contemporary film adaptation of Charles Dickens’s 1861 novel of the same name, co-written and directed by Alfonso Cuarón and starring Ethan Hawke, Gwyneth Paltrow, Hank Azaria, Robert De Niro, Anne Bancroft and Chris Cooper. It is known for having moved the setting of the original novel from 1812-1827 London to 1990s New York. The film is an abridged modernization of Dickens's 1861 novel, with the hero's name having also been changed from Pip to Finn, and the character Miss Havisham has been renamed Nora Dinsmoor. The film received mixed reviews. Ten-year-old
Great Expectations both detail homecoming. Although "David Copperfield" is based on much of Dickens personal experiences, "Great Expectations" provides, according to Paul Schlicke, "the more spiritual and intimate autobiography." Even though several elements hint at the setting – Miss Havisham, partly inspired by a Parisian duchess, whose residence was always closed and in darkness, surrounded by "a dead green vegetable sea", recalling Satis House, and the countryside bordering Chatham and Rochester – no place name is mentioned, nor a specific time period, which is indicated by, among other elements, older coaches, the title "His Majesty" in reference to George III, and the