Musing on Lost in Austen, a review which I'm writing as I watch it.

[shadowkat]

Trying to watch this movie Lost in Austen - which feels a bit like a fanfic - a Mary Sue Fanfic - you know the sort where the reader inserts themselves into a story and takes the heroines place and tells all the characters what to do? I'm somewhat bored - because I've seen too many versions of Pride and Prejudice - so know the story literally by heart. And this version feels a bit well like a Mary Sue fanfiction.

Here's the list of P&P's I've seen:

1. BBC presentation in 1980s
2. Laurence Olivier version in the 1930s?
3. A&E version with Colin Firth in the 1990s
4. Keira Knightly version in 2000
5. Bride and Prejudice - a sort of bollywood musical version by way of Hollywood
and now Lost in Austen (where the storyline is getting changed due to to the interloper.)


It does say some interesting things about fate. If we think of the writer as God, which I sort of do, then an interloper coming in and rewriting the story - demonstrates that once the characters become aware of their fate - their choices and options change as does the thread of the story.

Here, Amanda Price - the main character - rewrites the story so that she could end up with Mr. Darcy, and Jane ends up married to Mr. Collins. Seeing herself as the understudy to the lead, while Elizabeth Bennet lives Amanda Price's life in modern day London. But since we are limited to Ms. Price's pov - we have no idea what Elizabeth is up to. Meanwhile the story continues to fluctuate and change by the mere fact that Amanda Price has switched places with Elizabeth Bennett. It also conveys interesting things about class distinctions. Reminding me of something Momster told me about The Help - which turned out to be better than she thought. In that novel as in this one - the heroine is oblivious of the lines between people. She does not see the distinctions in class or color. It is the difference between the modern age and the previous age - now, we think little of those lines or distinctions in class and we rage at them. We no longer tolerate them. Jane Austen's novels are more than just "romances" they are satire. Light satire, but satire all the same. She makes fun of the petty politics and manners of her own age. Austen is fascinating, for much like Lousia May Alcott, she never married. And her work was a critique of her the class distinctions and gender issues of her own age. This film in some respects highlights those issues, demonstrating that Amanda Price's surface reading of
the novel - or focus on the romance, misses the point of it. That the world of Pride and Prejudice is not the world we want to re-enter. Books are lovely - because we can leave them on the bed side table, or inside our dreams, re-entering our own dull uneventful lives. Life by necessity is never quite as gripping or thrilling as the novel that ends on that final page.
Until that is the writer decides to pick up pen again, or in the case of fanfic - another one does. Here - Amanda Price fiddles with Jane Austen's work...making a mess of it.

Amanda Price is portrayed by the actress who played the lesbian on HEX. She's not bad. I'm not crazy about the actor playing Darcy.

Comments

[shipperx.livejournal.com]

Amanda Price is portrayed by the actress who played the lesbian on HEX. She's not bad. I'm not crazy about the actor playing Darcy

I liked her in Hex.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Yeah, she was amongst the best things in HEX. Hadn't seen her in a while.
This role was a bit too limp? Underdeveloped. We don't really know Amanda Price outside of the fact that she is obsessed with Pride & Prejudice but so was Bridget Jones and Bridget was a more interesting character.

[spikewriter]

I've seen the same productions! The MGM one was 1940, with a script by Aldous Huxley.

As for Lost in Austen, I'll confess to not having see all of it because I think my reaction was the same as yours. What I did find entertaining is Alex Kingston as Mrs. Bennett because that is not a role I would normally picture her in.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Hee. I had the same reaction - Alex Kingston as Mrs Bennet threw me as well and was the most entertaining thing in the story. I was bored.
I kept watching to see how it would end - and it basically ended in a somewhat lame and unrealistic manner. Reminded me a great deal of that Meg Ryan/Hugh Jackman romance - which I liked better.

I think I know the story too well. Also saw Bridget Jones Diary and read it.

[eilowyn.livejournal.com]

Whenever I hear something about Austen, I automatically think about my professor who is apparently the preeminent expert on the use of "Burke's sublime, beautiful, and picturesque in Austen." Then I remember that trying to get her to read Pride and Prejudice and Zombies was like pulling teeth.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

LOL!

Oh I would have loved to see her face when you showed her the novel Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. I still get a kick out of telling people about that one and Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. The look on their face is just priceless. Some people take English Literature far too seriously, particularly those in the field. (Sigh, yes, I was an English Lit major once upon a time, can't you tell? ;-) )

English Lit Professors have a tendency to have somewhat elitist cultured and sublime taste.

[flake-sake.livejournal.com]

I saw that one too a while ago, I thought it was bubblegum for the brain. Not really good are aspiring to atctually get the original, but fun at points.

I liked the scene where she asks Darcy to get wet for her and also the end when we find out how Lizzy has completely absorbed modern day life.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

It did have a few moments in there. But I'd seen Bridget Jones - which does those bits a tad better. Or may just be my mood.

[flake-sake.livejournal.com]

I's seen Bridget Jones before I read P&P, hence I didn't get the movie at all and filed it under forgettable rom com, but I think I should rewatch it from an Austen fannish perspective.

I wish there where more of these Austen-fan movies on her other books. I'd love to see a modern day Northanger abbey, it would work perfectly with the twilight hype.

[shadowkat67.livejournal.com]

Bridget Jones was a satire of romance novels and started its own little sub-genre - the chick-lit (starical modern romances featuring snarky and somewhat daft heroines such as Bridget). Yes, we can blame Helen Fielding for issuing in the dreaded chick-lit genre populated by heroines similar to Bridget Jones. Confessions of a Shop-a-holic is one that was made into a movie. Most of the others only were made into tv movies that aired on Lifetime. Charisma Carpenter and Nick Brendan were in one of them.

(sigh - I think I have read every possible genre out there.) ;-)

I wish there where more of these Austen-fan movies on her other books. I'd love to see a modern day Northanger abbey, it would work perfectly with the twilight hype.

Oh there are. "Clueless" was based on Emma. And I could swear I saw a really bad Northanger Abbey rip-off. But can't remember it.
Bride and Prejudice is a bollywood version based on P&P.