I’m a big P&P fan, and have seen both the 1980s and 1990s BBC versions, as well as the 1942 version with Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier.
So I was a bit sceptical about this new version… reading some interviews with the main scriptwriter gave me the impression that she was making it a bit too ‘modern’ to suit current tastes - I also got the impression that she hadn’t seen any other version, because she was making lots of assumptions about how hers would be more down to earth and realistic etc etc.
Anyway, I was pleasantly surprised. It’s really nice looking and beautifully directed – lots of greys and browns – and you really got the impression that the Bennet household was properly poor (they weren’t scrubbing floors etc, but you know what I mean) and that marriage was really the only way out. Mrs Bennet was portrayed surprisingly sympathetically – which made a nice change, as she’s often turned into a caricature. All the acting was pretty good – Keira Knightly was excellent, but she had to say some quite impertinent lines on occasion, and was a bit too sharp sometimes. Matthew McFayden – not sure if he can ever properly replace Colin Firth, but he did quite well in looking shy and glowering at the same time.
However,
One does not propose to a lady in her dressing gown! Jane would never have approved.
Some lapses in etiquette, therefore, but otherwise a really nice, romantic flick.
I may see this movie just for Judi Dench as Lady Catherine DeBurgh. The previews I’ve seen make it look a little too jokey, but that probably doesn’t reflect the actual tone of the movie itself.
Agreed that nobody can take the place of Colin Firth (especially if Matthew MacFadyen doesn’t go swimming in his shirt!), but any decently made adaptation of Jane Austen is okay by me.
Ah, mid-Novemebr it looks like. I should have saved all my blathering for one thread. I just watched the thread and it looks promising. I’ll definately be there on opening day.
I didn’t know this was coming out til yesterday when I saw the “movie artwork” edition of the paperback at the bookstore. My reaction was pretty skeptical. They had it beside the Ehle/Firth movie artwork edition. Of course I was just checking out the “new” Darcy and basing all my ideas on the fact that he’s not Colin Firth. I think my exact thoughts were “No. we have already got a perfect Darcy.” I’ll still go see it though.
You may not like what they’ve done, then, which is to set the film a bit further back that usual, ie, around 1797 (with the reason that the original draft of P&P, First Impressions, was written around then).
I can’t tell the difference personally but it means that lots of the older characters wear old style dresses (with the lower waist) and large powdered wigs, and Wickham has a ribbon in his hair.
As well as this, to go with the ‘realistic’ style, the costumes are fairly drab and ordinary. Lizzie in particular seems to wear lots of brown, school-marmish type dresses, which suit Keira a great deal but aren’t very flash.