I recently reread, rewatched,
and reviewed Mansfield
Park, which launched me on a deeper dive back into one of my very favorite
authors, and all the adaptations since the immortal (and unsurpassed) Jennifer
Ehle-Colin Firth Pride and Prejudice from 1995 (of the 2005 version with
Keira Knightley there is no need to speak).
I read several biographies, reread Persuasion, and then undertook
to slow-read Emma, savoring a few pages at a time and delighting in all
the ironies and foreshadowings, as well as the penetrating psychology of it
all. So then I had to go back and see
which adaptation best fulfilled my vision of the book.
Given her subsequent history, I was quite surprised to find Gwyneth Paltrow a perfectly decent Emma (1996, MC-66, AMZ), if a little swan-like, in Douglas McGrath’s lively but thoroughly Miramax-ed adaptation. Toni Collette as Harriet Smith and Ewan MacGregor as Frank Churchill are good, Jeremy Northam is appealing if not severe enough as Mr. Knightley, but Juliet Stevenson steals the show as Mrs. Elton.
It wasn’t that long ago that I enjoyed Anya Taylor-Joy as Emma (2020, MC-71), but on re-viewing after recent re-reading, I was much more intolerant, not so much with the highly-stylized and unhistorical design (first-time feature director Autumn de Wilde’s background was in music videos) as with a bad tendency to misrepresent the psychology of the characters and to invent scenes and dialogue that are just plain wrong. None of the performances are natural or definitive. Not as objectionable as the 2005 P&P, and fine for anyone who doesn’t realize what they are missing.
Nonetheless, I’ve long thought that Kate Beckinsale was the perfect Emma (1996, Wiki), and now even more so. The rest of the cast is top-notch as well, with unbeatable performances from Samantha Morton as Harriet, Mark Strong as Knightley, and Olivia Williams as Jane Fairfax. As with so many Austen adaptations, the script is by Andrew Davies, and the production team came over from the Ehle-Firth P&P, though in more abridged fashion. This film features a valuable new take on the sociological dimension of the story, by showing how the lifestyle of the characters is supported by the arduous labors of servants.
I’m leery of algorithms, but glad for the one that took me directly to another Beckinsale-in-Austen adaptation, Love & Friendship (2016, MC-87). Where twenty years before, Kate had played an immature young woman as conceived by a mature Austen, here she plays the older Lady Susan – the most accomplished flirt in England – as imagined by the teenaged Jane. Whit Stillman’s adaptation re-teams Beckinsale with Chloe Sevigny in a film that made my best of the year list at the time, and holds up quite well.
This survey prompted me to take yet another look at Sense and Sensibility (1995, Wiki), which may be taken to have started the Jane Austen boom in film adaptations. Wow, it’s still great. Emma Thompson’s Oscar-winning script makes the most of the only Austen novel I have no interest in rereading, her first to be published. She is also perfect as the sensible older sister, while a startlingly young Kate Winslet is superb as the sensitive younger sister. Counterintuitively, Ang Lee was a wonderful choice to direct, with a fresh eye for the English countryside and a knack for social satire and family drama. The supporting cast is exceptional, with many stars-in-waiting.
Roger Michell’s 1995 adaptation of Persuasion (Wiki) with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds ranks at or near the top of my favorite Jane Austen movies, and there’s a 2007 BBC version (Wiki) with an admirable Sally Hawkins that’s pretty good as well. (Reviewed here and here.) I found the Netflix version of 2022 unwatchable, with an utterly miscast Dakota Johnson (as bad as Keira Knightley in P&P).
Did I somehow miss Northanger Abbey (Wiki) when it appeared on Masterpiece in 2007, or was I simply not astute enough to recognize the stars that Felicity Jones and Carey Mulligan would become, and passed over it as a mere TV movie not worth a review. At any rate, I recently caught it on Kanopy, and whether I’d forgotten or not, was very happy to see it this go-round. Felicity (though two years older IRL) is the young ingenue new to Bath taken in by marital schemer Carey. As with so many British costume dramas, the character acting is good across the board, the settings and costumes first rate, and here one of Jane Austen’s slighter works, a parody of popular gothic novels, is handled with an appealing lightness.
Now I am back into re-reading Pride and Prejudice, and I’ll return with a postscript after taking another look at the canonical 1995 adaptation, and maybe even the one from 1940 with Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier. Perhaps I’ll even take another look at Romola Garai as Emma.
To whom I revert for a final thought. Famously, Jane Austen believed no one would like her title character, except herself. Famously, she has been proved wrong. Emma Woodhouse is no Emma Bovary, but in her own way just as selfish and self-deluded. Nonetheless her playfulness, wit, and good nature balance off her snobbery, privilege, and amour-propre. In her most mature work, Austen draws on her own younger self with satire and indulgence, and portrays in the person of Mr. Knightley the wisdom and acuity gained over time.
Paltrow gets the pampered princess, Taylor-Joy gets the supercilious snob, but Beckinsale gets it all, but most of all Emma’s youthful delight in her own small world, and her own active brain.
The Austen boon has petered out with lackluster extensions like Sanditon or pale imitations like Bridgerton, in which I take no interest, but leaves behind a handful of masterpieces. Without shame, I declare myself a genuine Janeite, both in print and on screen.
Given her subsequent history, I was quite surprised to find Gwyneth Paltrow a perfectly decent Emma (1996, MC-66, AMZ), if a little swan-like, in Douglas McGrath’s lively but thoroughly Miramax-ed adaptation. Toni Collette as Harriet Smith and Ewan MacGregor as Frank Churchill are good, Jeremy Northam is appealing if not severe enough as Mr. Knightley, but Juliet Stevenson steals the show as Mrs. Elton.
It wasn’t that long ago that I enjoyed Anya Taylor-Joy as Emma (2020, MC-71), but on re-viewing after recent re-reading, I was much more intolerant, not so much with the highly-stylized and unhistorical design (first-time feature director Autumn de Wilde’s background was in music videos) as with a bad tendency to misrepresent the psychology of the characters and to invent scenes and dialogue that are just plain wrong. None of the performances are natural or definitive. Not as objectionable as the 2005 P&P, and fine for anyone who doesn’t realize what they are missing.
Nonetheless, I’ve long thought that Kate Beckinsale was the perfect Emma (1996, Wiki), and now even more so. The rest of the cast is top-notch as well, with unbeatable performances from Samantha Morton as Harriet, Mark Strong as Knightley, and Olivia Williams as Jane Fairfax. As with so many Austen adaptations, the script is by Andrew Davies, and the production team came over from the Ehle-Firth P&P, though in more abridged fashion. This film features a valuable new take on the sociological dimension of the story, by showing how the lifestyle of the characters is supported by the arduous labors of servants.
I’m leery of algorithms, but glad for the one that took me directly to another Beckinsale-in-Austen adaptation, Love & Friendship (2016, MC-87). Where twenty years before, Kate had played an immature young woman as conceived by a mature Austen, here she plays the older Lady Susan – the most accomplished flirt in England – as imagined by the teenaged Jane. Whit Stillman’s adaptation re-teams Beckinsale with Chloe Sevigny in a film that made my best of the year list at the time, and holds up quite well.
This survey prompted me to take yet another look at Sense and Sensibility (1995, Wiki), which may be taken to have started the Jane Austen boom in film adaptations. Wow, it’s still great. Emma Thompson’s Oscar-winning script makes the most of the only Austen novel I have no interest in rereading, her first to be published. She is also perfect as the sensible older sister, while a startlingly young Kate Winslet is superb as the sensitive younger sister. Counterintuitively, Ang Lee was a wonderful choice to direct, with a fresh eye for the English countryside and a knack for social satire and family drama. The supporting cast is exceptional, with many stars-in-waiting.
Roger Michell’s 1995 adaptation of Persuasion (Wiki) with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds ranks at or near the top of my favorite Jane Austen movies, and there’s a 2007 BBC version (Wiki) with an admirable Sally Hawkins that’s pretty good as well. (Reviewed here and here.) I found the Netflix version of 2022 unwatchable, with an utterly miscast Dakota Johnson (as bad as Keira Knightley in P&P).
Did I somehow miss Northanger Abbey (Wiki) when it appeared on Masterpiece in 2007, or was I simply not astute enough to recognize the stars that Felicity Jones and Carey Mulligan would become, and passed over it as a mere TV movie not worth a review. At any rate, I recently caught it on Kanopy, and whether I’d forgotten or not, was very happy to see it this go-round. Felicity (though two years older IRL) is the young ingenue new to Bath taken in by marital schemer Carey. As with so many British costume dramas, the character acting is good across the board, the settings and costumes first rate, and here one of Jane Austen’s slighter works, a parody of popular gothic novels, is handled with an appealing lightness.
Now I am back into re-reading Pride and Prejudice, and I’ll return with a postscript after taking another look at the canonical 1995 adaptation, and maybe even the one from 1940 with Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier. Perhaps I’ll even take another look at Romola Garai as Emma.
To whom I revert for a final thought. Famously, Jane Austen believed no one would like her title character, except herself. Famously, she has been proved wrong. Emma Woodhouse is no Emma Bovary, but in her own way just as selfish and self-deluded. Nonetheless her playfulness, wit, and good nature balance off her snobbery, privilege, and amour-propre. In her most mature work, Austen draws on her own younger self with satire and indulgence, and portrays in the person of Mr. Knightley the wisdom and acuity gained over time.
Paltrow gets the pampered princess, Taylor-Joy gets the supercilious snob, but Beckinsale gets it all, but most of all Emma’s youthful delight in her own small world, and her own active brain.
The Austen boon has petered out with lackluster extensions like Sanditon or pale imitations like Bridgerton, in which I take no interest, but leaves behind a handful of masterpieces. Without shame, I declare myself a genuine Janeite, both in print and on screen.
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