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!
Emma
Emma Woodhouse leads a charmed life at her widowed father's country estate. Being rich, clever, popular and used to getting her own way, Emma thinks she knows all there is to know about life and love. When her beloved governess gets married, Emma takes full credit for the match and decides to occupy herself by playing cupid amongst her company (as she has determined, at age 20, that she herself will never fall in love and therefore has no need to marry). She concentrates on uniting Harriet, an impressionable young orphan, with social climber Mr. Elton, despite her good friend Mr. Knightley's warnings against meddling. Emma is so assured in the brilliance of her scheme that she successfully convinces Harriet to refuse humble farmer Mr Martin's marriage proposal. By the time Emma discovers Mr. Elton is more interested in herself than in Harriet, her friend's hopes for marrying into wealth have reached impossible heights. At the same time, Emma reconsiders her stance on marriage when she ignites a casual flirtation with impetuous Frank Churchill. Mr. Knightley's aggravation mounts when he sees his young friend pursuing the wrong man.
When Jane Austen began writing Emma, she told a friend, "I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like". Millions of readers would disagree, but truly, no other Austen heroine is more difficult to render likable on screen. This is not a problem in Diarmuid Lawrence's 1996 television version of "Emma" (the eighth installment of "The Complete Jane Austen"), which stars a young Kate Beckinsale as our know-it-all protagonist. Beckinsale gets it right, because she's smarter than the character. She gets inside Emma's unwarranted swagger and plays it so sternly that you can't help but laugh at her when she solemnly speaks of her misguided plans. There are moments when you almost want to hate her, like when she huffs and puffs at Harriet and Mr. Martin every time they meet. But just as you are cursing her for interfering with her friend's happiness, you're laughing at Emma's serious and completely unfounded belief that Harriet must be the natural daughter of an aristocrat. The subtle ridiculousness is all in the script (another of Andrew Davies's spotless adaptations) and Beckinsale is expert at translating that into a quiet scowl or a smug grin.
It's a shame that this little-remembered "Emma" was overshadowed by the thankfully forgotten feature film version that was also released in 1996. That Emma starred a preening Gwyneth Paltrow as our heroine. The problem with Paltrow is that she doesn't seem altogether different from her character - haughty, indignant and in love with herself. Her chemistry with Jeremy Northam's Knightley left me cold. The Internet Movie Database claims that Northam is married to a woman in real life, but this adaptation convinced me that he was gay. Topping off this disappointing mess is screenwriter/director Douglas McGrath's script, which is hallow of Jane's words and full of scenes that aren't in the book.
John Glenister's 1972 five hour "Emma" mini-series promises a more thorough adaptation of the story, but ruined this writer's inclination to watch by starring hideous, shrill Doran Godwin. The first dvd was back in the case before the first scene had ended.
Conversely, I have never watched another film more frequently than writer/director Amy Heckerling's Clueless, 1995's far-flung adaptation of the text. Not only is this the best modernization of any Austen novel, it is also the best Emma. In this version, Emma is Cher (Alicia Silverstone), a beautiful and charming Beverly Hills high school student whose main interests include dressing well, driving terribly (with a learner's permit, without an adult), caring for her gruff attorney father (played by brilliant character actor Dan Hedaya) and, of course, match-making. Eager to prove to her "do-gooder" ex-stepbrother Josh (Paul Rudd) that her ploys are not purely based on self-interest, Cher takes on her toughest project to date - a working class, East coast stoner named Tai (Brittany Murphy). Despite Tai's immediate interest in dizzy skateboarder Travis Birkenstock, Cher determines that popular and arrogant Elton is a better choice for her wayward pal. And the parody builds from there.
What makes this movie such a great adaptation is that, even with all of the contemporary twists, the all-important tone is exactly as it should be. Emma is one of Austen's more comic stories and this retelling is genuinely hilarious, from the "As if!" valley girl slang to the clever choice of casting Christian - the modern-day Frank Churchill - as a homosexual (it isn't hard to believe that Frank may have been gay, as well). The point is that Heckerling managed to use the framework of a brilliant tale to tell a story that is as funny to modern viewers as the original must have been to a more genteel audience. I'd like to think that Jane, herself, would be proud of that feat.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment