Jane Addiction Part 7 - Pride and Prejudice Vol III

Welcome to my 10 week critique of films based on the works of Jane Austen. I will review each installment of PBS's "Masterpiece: The Complete Jane Austen" and also take a look at other adaptations of the same novel. Enjoy!

Note: "Masterpiece" just ended it's three week presentation of the 1995 Pride and Prejudice mini-series. During these three weeks, I gave a synopsis of each installment and also examined different types of P&P adaptations, including the tv mini-series and the Hollywood period piece. This week, I will focus on modernized interpretations of the story, which I call far-flung adaptations.

Pride and Prejudice Vol III
Synopsis:While enjoying her vacation in the Derbyshire countryside, Elizabeth Bennet is surprised to be Mr. Darcy's honored guest at his palatial home. She becomes quickly attached to his younger sister Georgiana (the would-be bride of the lecherous Wickham), who has heard so much of Lizzy from her brother. But before Lizzy can make sense of this new dynamic, she receives a shocking letter from her sister Jane: their youngest sister, Lydia, has run off with Wickham. Darcy happens to visit Lizzy just as she is receiving the news and she confides in him. As she prepares to return home immediately, he abruptly leaves. Knowing that she is, in all likelihood, about to become the sister-in-law of his arch nemesis, Lizzy realizes that she may have lost Darcy's interest forever, and that actually bothers her.

Lizzy returns to a home in turmoil. Her father has gone to London to find Lydia and Wickham and her mother is hysterical. Lizzy feels guilty for not revealing Wickham's true character beforehand. Soon, it becomes apparent that the couple have not married, and Lydia may be destined for a terrible reputation and no marital prospects (a fate actually worse than being married to Wickham). Mr. Bennet fails to find the two and returns home in shame. Miraculously, the Bennets receive word from the Gardiners that Wickham and Lydia have been found and will marry if Mr. Bennet agrees to give them one hundred pounds annually. Knowing that this could never be enough to entice Wickham, Mr. Bennet suspects that the Gardiners have bribed Wickham handsomely.

The newlyweds pay an uncomfortable visit to the Bennet home. As Lydia is bragging to her sisters about the wedding, she accidentally mentions that Mr. Darcy was there. Burning with curiosity, Lizzy confronts her aunt Gardiner about Darcy's role in Lydia's marriage and finds out that it was Darcy who paid Wickham to marry her. Lizzy realizes that he could only have done this out of consideration to herself and her hopes are rekindled. Shortly after the Wickhams leave for Newcastle, Bingley return to Netherfield with Darcy in tow. Jane and Lizzy are reunited with their suitors and Bingley quickly proposes to Jane. Darcy, however, is his old standoffish self, which confuses Lizzy. But she is completely thrown when Lady Catherine De Bourgh shows up on her porch, demanding that Lizzy promise to never marry her nephew.

Two of the very best Pride and Prejudice adaptations are modernizations of the text: the 2001 film version of Bridget Jones's Diary and the 2004 musical Bride and Prejudice. One story reshapes an average modern-day single Englishwoman as Elizabeth Bennet while the other faithfully interprets the marital politics of the original text through a Bollywood lens.

Bride and Prejudice's main success as a P&P adaptation is that very thoroughness that simply cannot be achieved in a contemporary western interpretation of the story. Most American women today are unlikely to relate completely to the marital woes of the Bennet girls. But in the context of an eastern society, where arranged marriages and dowries are more the norm, Elizabeth and Jane - or in this case, Lalita and Jaya - actually make complete sense in the present. In this version, Lalita and Darcy are socially divided by class and cultural differences. He is a brash, arrogant white American and Bingley is the Indian English Balraj Bingley who brings him to Armristar for a friends' wedding, where they meet the Bakshi daughters. And with the dazzling musical number that follows, this film really takes off. In addition to telling Austen's story really well, B&P adds enormous fun by being a Bollywood musical.

Famous Bollywood star Aishwarya Rai is well-cast as Lalita - she has the chops for the musical bits and she also gets the smartness of the character. Martin Henderson's Darcy, though not being nearly as dashing as Colin Firth or Laurence Olivier, is quite perfect as an obnoxious American. It's amusing to see Darcy interpreted this way. And for some fun, against-type casting, check out Naveen Andrews (tortured ex-torturer Sayeed from "Lost") as Bingley and Gilmore Girl Alexis Bledel as Georgie Darcy.

The casting is just another fine feature of this very canny adaptation. Overall, this version of P&P captures the spirit of the story better than most, and even outs forth a compelling and believable premise, despite the ramdom outbursts of song and dance.

The courtship of Elizabeth and Darcy takes a very different direction in Bridget Jones's Diary. Renee Zellweger's Bridget bears little resemblance to our Lizzy, at least at first. This character is best known for her flaws - her (over)weight, her propensity to get drunk and then stumble into work hungover, her "verbal diarrhea" tick, etc. In other words, she's a normal, lonely, single woman in her early thirties. Her main problem is that she has no confidence. Her discontent comes into a focus when she meets stuffy Mark Darcy at her mother's New Year's party and she overhears him insulting her. And like a modern-day Lizzy Bennet, she soon finds herself sleeping with Darcy's nemesis, Daniel Cleaver, who also happens to be her boss.

And thus, we have a contemporary tale of a questionably marriageable woman. In this rendition, our heroine suffers more from personal demons than social constraints, but our hero is just the same. In fact, this Darcy is also portrayed by Colin Firth, who, along with screenwriter Andrew Davies, carries much of the 1995 P&P mini-series into this story. His interactions with Zellweger bring out her inner Lizzy, as she unwittingly mocks his high class world with her nervous banter. Hugh Grant's Cleaver is the best Wickham that ever graced a P&P adaptation, bearing the perfect balance of sleazy and sexy. Even though you immediately sense his danger, you understand why Bridget falls for him.

A beautifully paced collection of hilarious vignettes, BJD is one of the most beloved Austen adaptations. In an era where an Elizabeth Bennet is no longer ahead of her time, it is so refreshing to see, instead, a woman who embodies all of our common fears. And in the end, that very average lady can still get her Darcy.