Pride and Prejudice, The VV Movie Review
So, last night I watched the remake - the Keira Knightly version - of Pride and Prejudice. We have Charter cable and with that digital service comes the ability to watch movies from the movie channels "on Demand." It is really pretty handy. Last night, I chose to watch this remake. What the hell, I had time to kill between working out and falling asleep.
The whole thing struck me as rather tepid, to be honest. They were in such a rush to cram the entire story into 2 hours that the depth of emotion suffered. Let's face it, the title is "Pride and Prejudice" not "Sort of Proud and Non-commital Bias."
The BBC version starring Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth (sigh...) remains the standard. This 6-hour version is by far superior because the depth of Elizabeth's pride and her prejudice and Mr. Darcy's pride and prejudice, are allowed to fully develop. This new version was so rushed that one would think Elizabeth disliked Darcy because he doesn't dance and thinks her only fair-looking. The whole debacle involving Wickham is rushed to the point that he doesn't even seem too much of a cad. And the ending just sucked. It was more romanatic, in a way, than the BBC version, but only as it is displayed in today's society. It was a bit of a stretch. This movie was sort of the crib notes version, if you will. The relationships are not developed, the emotions are not allowed to ripen, the complications do not seem very complicated...Jane Austen is rolling in her grave.
To be honest, I actually preferred the actress who played Jane in the new version to the BBC version. She was prettier and portrayed the ethereal serenity perfectly. Keira Knightly, however, was too pretty to be Elizabeth. She wasn't portrayed as bookish, which is what Elizabeth really was.
It was a cartoon version, without the great color, lunchbox tie-in, and no sudden un-masking of the villain. Don't bother yourself.
