Thursday, August 18, 2011

A Very Jane Austen Thursday

Hello!!

If you know me then you know that my love for Thursdays is extensive, and hardly rivaled by my love for Jane Austen, (right,) though I do love her books. So, given that I'm not all that pleased with my Emma post, I've decided to play a new game. Ready for it? It's called....

My Favorite Jane Austen Movie!!!

Yay!!! **Applause**

The contestants are...

Mansfield Park
While the characters are nice enough, and the story is story-ish enough, this movie adds a dash of "Oh, wow. I wish I didn't see that." It includes disturbing drawings, and a Titanic nude scene. (Not "Titanic" as in a "big nude scene," but "Titanic" in that it was PG13 and had nudity in it... like Titanic.) The story follows Fanny who moves in with her uncle and his obnoxious children, kind of like Jane Eyre, only they're less horrible, and Fanny falls in love with this dude, but this other dude wants to marry her. She rejects this other dude, much to the objection of her uncle, and he sends her back to her poor family. She feels like she doesn't belong anywhere, blah, blah, blah, happy ending, although, apparently "it could have ended differently."


BBC's Pride and Prejudice
If you have six hours to spare you should pop in this mini series. If you've seen it then you've read the book and if you've read the book than you've seen this movie. For those of you who get angry at movies for taking liberties with novels, then this is the movie for you. It's exactly, nearly word-for-word, the book. The acting is wonderful, and the cast includes Helena Bonham Carter's brother, Crispin. The movie is about Elizabeth who hates Mr. Darcy, (Colin Firth,) and grows to love him because he's not as big as a jerk as he pretends to be.  There's some drama with Elizabeth's stupid sister, but for details you're just gonna have to watch it.


The Awful Keira Knightly Pride and Prejudice
This movie takes so many liberties and strays so far from the novel that I can barely call it Pride and Prejudice. It's nauseating. It was only produced because Pride and Prejudice was in fashion and they knew they'd make a butt-load of cash off of it... which they did. Beware of movies that are made strictly to bring in cash. The best movies are made because someone has a vision - see Lord of the Rings.


Sense and Sensibility
Speaking of having a vision.... Emma Thompson, who stars in this film next to Alan Rickman (we've talked about this; you should know who Alan Rickman is!) Hugh Grant, and Titanic's Kate Winslet, wrote the screen play and received an Oscar for it, (Thompson, not Winslet.) The movie was nominated for other Oscars including best actress, best supporting actress, best cinematography, best costume design, best original score, and best picture. I adore this film. It's about two sisters, one irrational and passionate, and one responsible and logical.


Emma (Gwyneth Paltow)
We've already discussed this movie so I'm going to move on.


Emma (Kate Beckinsale)
Oh, look at that. Moving on....


Persuasion  (below)
Anne is a plain girl who is persuaded (we have a title!) not to marry the awesome Captain Wentworth and she spends quite an enormous amount of time regretting it. It's a very fun story, and the characters are extremely relatable.


So, my favorite is...
Sense and Sensibility. Yay!!!! **Cheers**

3 comments:

  1. I don't know which was more depressing- Mansfield Park or Persuasion. And you know somewhere out there is some HUGE Jane Austin fan who is like, "Those are the best ones, you uncultured philistine!"

    Tough choice between BBC Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility! (BTW- have you seen Lost in Austen yet? So funny!) And I noticed you left out 'Pride and Prejudice- a Latter-day tale' so... What Gives???

    ReplyDelete
  2. I haven't seen Lost in Austen! I'll have to check it out.

    I also didn't include Bride and Prejudice... maybe I should.

    I like Persuasion. But you're right, it is pretty dull. It's certainly no Sense and Sensibility or Pride and Prejudice.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Lost in Austen is pretty good. I think the KK Pride and Prejudice was awful, it tried to be like the excellent BBC version with Jennifer Ehle. Best book - Emma. Best adaptation - the BBC Pride and Prejudice. Best film - probably Emma again, although Sense and Sensibility is enjoyable enough.

    ReplyDelete