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Persuasion
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|  | I was very excited about this video when it came out and was extremely disappointed, even though the hero was a very handsome one. Too short, difficult to follow, bizarre filming and bland costumes. If you are a true Austen fan, watch the older version, you will love every minute!
| | | I have always loved the 1995 version with Amanda Root and Ciarán Hinds, but this version is better. You see more of their emotions, and the longing each has. I may be prejudiced as it is my favourite Austen, but its a great movie regardless of that.
| | When will they ever learn? | |
| | For almost two hundred years, through great changes in society, Jane Austen's novels have been delighting readers. This might suggest that she really knew what she was doing. The best screenwriters, in adapting her novels to film or video, have acknowledged her genius and followed her plots and characterizations as closely as possible considering the differences in media. Simon Burke, for some reason,thought he could do better.
This version of Persuasion is inferior in almost every way to the Amanda Root-Ciarn Hinds version, though it is a little better than the 1971 BBC trainwreck. Rather than relying on the actress to convey Ann Eliot's character, Davies has set her to writing in her diary, and given her many of the observations of the omniscient narrator. The effect, as actress Sally Hawkins scratches away with her pen in the dim candle-light, is to make Ann seem a whiney, miserable sort of woman. Many of the incidents in the book that show her actual strength of character and self-knowledge were left unfilmed. In a misguided attempt to make Ann seem a little less passive, Burke and director Adrian Shergold have her running through the streets of Bath, in the rain, in search of Captain Wentworth. No respectable woman of the time could have done anything of the kind; Sally Hawkins looks like Chicken Little about to announce that the sky is falling.
The cast are, for the most part, up the usual British standard, though far inferior to the ensemble in the Amanda Root version. It is very pleasant to see the famously beautiful eldest Eliot sister played by a real beauty, Alice Krige, but Rupert Penry-Jones is rather too handsome for the presumably at least somewhat weather-beaten Captain Wentworth. In the novel we learn that the once pretty Ann experienced a renewal of bloom under the influence of love (and some male attention from her wicked cousin), but the director has had Sally Hawkins dressed and coiffed with relentless plainess. Why make the hero so much prettier than the heroine?
If you love Jane Austen's book, this version is sure to annoy.
| | A good shot that has been been bested. | |
| | Despite the more than slightly lackluster camera work this is overall an enjoyable incarnation. The cast and crew do a fair justice to the story, the intensity of long sought romance is well executed, and the uncertainty of Wentworths affections is duly felt, little else however seems to matter.
The extended time seems to have been ill managed, as the frustrated ghost of an old romance dominates the movies psychology with long silences and much scenery. To be fair it does increase the viewers pleasure at the inevitable happy outcome. Yet the story seems less lively than its 1995 predecessor. Background characters like the unsurpassable Miss Musgroves, and the involvement with Mrs. Clay and the familys financial trouble appear almost as grudging afterthoughts. The Musgrove family, particularly sister Mary is disappointing when compared with the wonderful satire of the 1995 version.
Perhaps a close comparison is unfair; this is a very enjoyable and admirably cast production that adheres sufficiently and with engrossing historical detail to one of the best and most mature of the Austin canon.
Overall: a strong effort despite a slightly mouseish, somewhat too young and consistently thunderstruck female lead. Although I stick by the 95 rendition this version is far from unwatchable and shouldnt be overlooked by the true Austin-aficionado.
| | | I very much liked this version of Jane Austen's Persuasion, I found the characters very believable, and I love that you get a bit more emotions from Anne, especially when she is writing her letters. The only thing I really don't like about this film is the kissing scene it takes them so long to kiss. However, I have to say if you're a fan of the 1995 version as I am I equally like both versions, and think they both have something that the other doesn't.
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