1. It would seem that the purpose of creating a storyline parallel to the relationship between Tristan and Isolde is to elevate the meaning/implications of the relationship. The war between Britain and Ireland dramatizes the plot even more; therefore there is more emotional strain between Tristan and Isolde, as the affair would have much bigger implications than it did in the text. The audience also gets a bigger sense of impending fate on all of the characters, which orients them to the remainder of the film.
2. In the place of the love potion device, Tristan and Isolde meet and fall in love before King Mark is even a factor in their relationship. This seems to make their love more pure and believable, and it puts a more realistic strain on their emotions when they are forced to separate.
3. I think that King Mark is a much more sympathetic character in the film than he was in the text. He was just pathetic in the text. The film gave him a background, a repertoire, and a depth of character. He appears to be a strong, intelligent, and genuine character in the film. Though this should make it more difficult to sympathize with the lovers, I think the audience can generally sympathize with Tristan and Isolde as well, especially since their initial introduction was changed for the film. Also, there is a noticeable focus on feministic issues that plays well into the interpretation of Isolde's situation and how she deals with it. The film added in a scene in which Isodle is being told by her father that she is to be married; her speech about wanting to have a life of her own and not wanting to be a prize to be won reflects a more modern viewpoint of the situation.
4. Isolde’s decision to keep her name hidden reflects the portrayal of her in the text as being crafty with language. I suppose that this theme of hiding vital information could reflect an overall theme in their relationship: their love is always underscored by a lie. Also, in the text it was Tristan who was having the “identity crisis,” but in the film this conflict seems to be shared almost equally between Tristan and Isolde. This could be the result of the feministic overtones in the film.
5. The barons represent the opposing force in the movie, just as they do in the film. In both versions, their motivations appear somewhat morally gray: in the text, they are jealous of King Mark’s favoritism towards Tristan and try to expose him, but they are only doing their jobs and never actually betray Mark. The ambiguity towards them is forces upon the reader in the text. However, the film version makes the barons are believably “evil”: one major difference is that they are not as supportive of King Mark as the text makes them out to be. The revealing of the affair is not an attempt to warn Mark, but to take him down. The barons better represent betrayal in the film than they do in the text, and their motivation for power makes them more dimensional characters.
6. Technically, Tristan was killed by the same thing in both the text and the film: in the text, he died because he thought that Isolde had betrayed his love, and in the film he died because the barons had betrayed King Mark to the King of Ireland. Therefore, I think that this theme of betrayal as the underlying killer of Tristan represents the way that he seemed to betray his loyalty to King Mark by falling in love with Isolde. On another note, I think that the reason why Isolde “disappeared” in the film instead of simply dying is because, since her father betrayed her and she in turn betrayed King Mark, she has no home for her heart when Tristan dies.
7. I think that the focus on the film lies balanced between the relationship of Tristan and Isolde and the relationship between Britain and Ireland. The overlying theme of war brings the implications of the love between Tristan and Isolde to a new and more dramatic level. If the focus were simply on the affair, the rest of the world wouldn’t have as much of a reason to be engaged in the conflict (in the text, the author used the townspeople as a reflection of the way the reader should react to the situation, but it resulted in flat characterization of the townspeople).
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