Watching: Little Women
Dec. 30th, 2019 06:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
white_hartOur last cinema trip of the year was to see Greta Gerwig's new adaptation of Little Women. I have to confess to a certain amount of trepidation about this one; I have loved Little Women for nearly 40 years, though I haven't dared to re-read it in adulthood in case it turns out to have been visited by the Suck Fairy (I did read one of Alcott's other novels a few years ago, and found it quite uncomfortably moralistic), and I have generally been disappointed by adaptations (I don't think I even made it to the end of episode 1 of the TV adaptation that was on a couple of years ago). However, I really liked Gerwig's directorial debut, Lady Bird, and the reviews for Little Women were generally very good, so we gave it a try.
As it turned out, I loved Gerwig's interpretation of the story. One of my worries, going with T who has never read the book, was that the adaptation might feel twee, hackneyed or mawkish; Gerwig's choice to tell the story out of order, using the second half of part 2 (the part sometimes published separately as Good Wives, though I always knew them as two halves oft the same book) as a frame with the earlier story told in flashback made it feel fresh and new, and I appreciated the stylistic choice that coloured the "past" scenes with a golden tinge and the "present" with a harsher, bluer light. All of the familiar, beloved scenes from the first half of the novel are there - 'Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents*', Jo singeing Meg's hair and meeting Laurie at the party, Amy burning Jo's manuscript and then falling through the ice, Meg giving in to vanity at her Vanity Fair - but the main focus of the film is the story of the sisters' later lives, in particular Jo's and Amy's (Meg seems to have less screen time, by comparison, and poor Beth's story is necessarily limited). I'm much less familiar with this part of the novel; I'm sure I have read it just as often as the beginning, but it didn't engage my attention as a child, and hasn't stayed with me in the same way, so I very much enjoyed seeing it on screen. (And maybe I will actually re-read the book soon.)
Saoirse Ronan is very good as Jo, though possibly a bit too pretty and dainty; I kept failing to recognise Emma Watson as Meg, but for me the stand-out performance among the sisters was Florence Pugh as Amy, managing to bring real depth to a character I'd always dismissed as shallow and annoying. (I'm also amused that two of the four March sisters were brought up in Oxford.) Meryl Streep also does a terrifically acerbic Aunt March. And, as a knitter I couldn't help noticing some fabulous shawls (mostly triangular shawls worn crossed over the bust and tied in the back - and I see that Beth's at least is on Ravelry) and at least one really nice pair of colourwork mittens.
All in all, I thought this was a fantastic adaption, though I do wish I'd thought to take extra tissues - I haven't cried so much at a film since I, Daniel Blake!
* which I gather that Clare Balding, on Celebrity Who Wants to be a Millionaire, confidently declared to be the opening line of Middlemarch
As it turned out, I loved Gerwig's interpretation of the story. One of my worries, going with T who has never read the book, was that the adaptation might feel twee, hackneyed or mawkish; Gerwig's choice to tell the story out of order, using the second half of part 2 (the part sometimes published separately as Good Wives, though I always knew them as two halves oft the same book) as a frame with the earlier story told in flashback made it feel fresh and new, and I appreciated the stylistic choice that coloured the "past" scenes with a golden tinge and the "present" with a harsher, bluer light. All of the familiar, beloved scenes from the first half of the novel are there - 'Christmas won't be Christmas without any presents*', Jo singeing Meg's hair and meeting Laurie at the party, Amy burning Jo's manuscript and then falling through the ice, Meg giving in to vanity at her Vanity Fair - but the main focus of the film is the story of the sisters' later lives, in particular Jo's and Amy's (Meg seems to have less screen time, by comparison, and poor Beth's story is necessarily limited). I'm much less familiar with this part of the novel; I'm sure I have read it just as often as the beginning, but it didn't engage my attention as a child, and hasn't stayed with me in the same way, so I very much enjoyed seeing it on screen. (And maybe I will actually re-read the book soon.)
Saoirse Ronan is very good as Jo, though possibly a bit too pretty and dainty; I kept failing to recognise Emma Watson as Meg, but for me the stand-out performance among the sisters was Florence Pugh as Amy, managing to bring real depth to a character I'd always dismissed as shallow and annoying. (I'm also amused that two of the four March sisters were brought up in Oxford.) Meryl Streep also does a terrifically acerbic Aunt March. And, as a knitter I couldn't help noticing some fabulous shawls (mostly triangular shawls worn crossed over the bust and tied in the back - and I see that Beth's at least is on Ravelry) and at least one really nice pair of colourwork mittens.
All in all, I thought this was a fantastic adaption, though I do wish I'd thought to take extra tissues - I haven't cried so much at a film since I, Daniel Blake!
* which I gather that Clare Balding, on Celebrity Who Wants to be a Millionaire, confidently declared to be the opening line of Middlemarch
