The Ottery
“If an otter can’t have fun doing something, it just simply won’t do it.”

Becoming Jane . . . with the help of Mr. Tumnus?

February 22nd, 2007

So, now that Hollywood has almost run out of Jane Austen novels to make movies from (Northhanger Abbey is still left, true, but since it’s a satire of Gothic novels, it would be hard to adapt well), they’re making a movie from Jane Austen’s life—or a mostly imagined version of her life.

The film centers around a young Austen’s infatuation with a young Irishman, played here by James McAvoy (a.k.a. Mr. Tumnus). Austen did indeed write a letter to her sister Cassandra telling of her flirtation with Mr. Lefroy, but it was apparently short-lived and without much consequence. The movie trailer, however, heavily implies that Austen couldn’t have written her novels without this “experience” of love—a strangely modern notion, this idea that writing depends on first-hand experience.

The trailer irritates me for many reasons, and I’m not entirely sure what all of them are. Part of it is the music recycled from Sense and Sensibility and Little Women (which, excuse me, sounds so distinctly American—in fact, it’s usually used in trailers for nostalgic, Americana-type films—that it’s ridiculously out of place here). Part of it is undoubtedly the premise of the film, and part of it is Anne Hathaway’s voice. Despite bearing the name of Shakespeare’s wife, the American actress doesn’t seem right for the part. Also, there are naked bottoms in the trailer—must be because it’s the international, unrated one. The film itself will be PG.

I think what I most resent, though, is the title of the film, which implies that Jane Austen isn’t herself, isn’t complete, until she falls in love. In other words, she’s not complete unless she has given her heart to a man, which is a pretty icky message, in my opinion. (And, I would add, you can’t really love someone unless you are complete in yourself–if you are yourself on your own, you have so much more to give.)

According to an article in the Telegraph, Becoming Jane prides itself on its “authenticity” and “earthiness”:

“Becoming Jane certainly looks different from most other Austen productions. It is still a period picture, with magnificent country houses and carriages, and a Wordsworthian rapture for fields, but the air is cold and wet, the colours are earthy – mustard, yellow ochre, burnt sienna – and there is a wintry feel draped over proceedings. For once you hear the squelch of mud and the sound of crows and pheasants rising out of the mist. Even the costumes seem oddly casual.

Hathaway isn’t wearing the signature Austen Empire line, but simple cotton dresses. ‘This film is set much earlier than the period typically shown in Austen films,’ says Eimer Ni Mhaoldomhnaigh, who was responsible for about 3,000 costumes. ‘The really high waists were not yet fashionable and I wanted Jane’s world to have a simple country feel to it, so her dresses are very plain in shape and structure.’”

Hmmm . . . where have we heard this before? The most recent Pride and Prejudice, anyone? Now, I certainly don’t mind pigs and Irish wolfhounds traipsing across the screen, and there were things I liked about that version, but to me it seemed to focus on the mud at the expense of the wit. And, with Becoming Jane, authenticity seems to be left by the wayside when it comes to late-eighteenth-century philosophies of writing.

Why is there suddenly this obsession with claiming to be different from all the other Austen films?

No doubt I’ll see the movie–and probably in the theater, too–but let it be known beforehand that I am dubious about its quality. (By the way, it opens here in August, though the British premiere is next month.)

Entry Filed under: Books, Movies