BBC Little Women, episode 1
Sep. 7th, 2018 03:14 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
osprey_archerThe room is lit with a soft golden light; the camera is in soft focus. Young women in white Victorian undergarments frolic before the camera, which is set too close for us to catch more than glimpses of their faces.
"Is this softcore Victorian porn?" Julie asked.
This is actually the beginning of the new BBC adaptation of Little Women. It has not devolved into softcore Victorian porn - yet, at least; we've only watched the first of three episodes - although it does devote a certain amount of time to the March sisters in their undergarments. I would accuse it of being male-gazey, but both the writer (Heidi Thomas) and the director (Vanessa Caswill) are women, so I guess I'm just going to have to call it baffling.
A lot of the adaptation choices are baffling. Some of the issues may come out right over the next two episodes, so I will restrain myself right now to two complaints.
First: they got Marmee all wrong. She's supposed to be a pillar of loving strength, and instead she's weepy and irritable and ineffective. When Jo attacks Amy after discovering that Amy has burned her book, Marmee flees the room. Marmee would never flee when her girls needed her!
The second problem is Amy herself, and in particular, the miniseries' handling of the scene where Amy burns Jo's treasured manuscript because Jo refuses to take her to a play. In the book, this is the impulsive action of a vengeful and perhaps slightly spoiled child, who is filled with remorse once she sees how badly she's hurt Jo. In the miniseries...
Well, first of all, in the miniseries Amy's actress is in her twenties. We may be supposed to believe that she's twelve, but even in pigtails she doesn't look a day younger than seventeen. She's older, so the action seems even more monstrous, and the direction really leans that monstrousness.
We don't just hear about the book-burning after the fact: we see her feed it into Hannah's stove page by page, her face gleaming demonically in the firelight. When Jo discovers that her manuscript has been burned, Amy slinks - positively slinks, like a sexy cartoon villainous - across the room to gloat about her evil deed. "I told you that you'd be sorry," she says, deeply satisfied with herself. Marmee eventually gets Amy to apologize, but it's grudging and fake, and when Jo refuses to accept it, Amy flounces down the stairs with her nose in the air.
Marmee's attempt to talk Jo into instant forgiveness is hard to take at the best of times, but in this adaptation, it makes absolutely no sense. Why should Jo forgive Amy when Amy feels no remorse?
Are they trying to make Amy a psychopath? If that's what they're aiming for, I guess they succeeded, but I'm not sure how they're going to make the Amy/Laurie endgame palatable when Psychopath Amy March would undoubtedly ruin Laurie's life. And Amy/Laurie is already a difficult sell for many people. Why make this harder than it has to be?
"Is this softcore Victorian porn?" Julie asked.
This is actually the beginning of the new BBC adaptation of Little Women. It has not devolved into softcore Victorian porn - yet, at least; we've only watched the first of three episodes - although it does devote a certain amount of time to the March sisters in their undergarments. I would accuse it of being male-gazey, but both the writer (Heidi Thomas) and the director (Vanessa Caswill) are women, so I guess I'm just going to have to call it baffling.
A lot of the adaptation choices are baffling. Some of the issues may come out right over the next two episodes, so I will restrain myself right now to two complaints.
First: they got Marmee all wrong. She's supposed to be a pillar of loving strength, and instead she's weepy and irritable and ineffective. When Jo attacks Amy after discovering that Amy has burned her book, Marmee flees the room. Marmee would never flee when her girls needed her!
The second problem is Amy herself, and in particular, the miniseries' handling of the scene where Amy burns Jo's treasured manuscript because Jo refuses to take her to a play. In the book, this is the impulsive action of a vengeful and perhaps slightly spoiled child, who is filled with remorse once she sees how badly she's hurt Jo. In the miniseries...
Well, first of all, in the miniseries Amy's actress is in her twenties. We may be supposed to believe that she's twelve, but even in pigtails she doesn't look a day younger than seventeen. She's older, so the action seems even more monstrous, and the direction really leans that monstrousness.
We don't just hear about the book-burning after the fact: we see her feed it into Hannah's stove page by page, her face gleaming demonically in the firelight. When Jo discovers that her manuscript has been burned, Amy slinks - positively slinks, like a sexy cartoon villainous - across the room to gloat about her evil deed. "I told you that you'd be sorry," she says, deeply satisfied with herself. Marmee eventually gets Amy to apologize, but it's grudging and fake, and when Jo refuses to accept it, Amy flounces down the stairs with her nose in the air.
Marmee's attempt to talk Jo into instant forgiveness is hard to take at the best of times, but in this adaptation, it makes absolutely no sense. Why should Jo forgive Amy when Amy feels no remorse?
Are they trying to make Amy a psychopath? If that's what they're aiming for, I guess they succeeded, but I'm not sure how they're going to make the Amy/Laurie endgame palatable when Psychopath Amy March would undoubtedly ruin Laurie's life. And Amy/Laurie is already a difficult sell for many people. Why make this harder than it has to be?
no subject
Date: 2018-09-07 08:30 pm (UTC)Aaaaaargh.
no subject
Date: 2018-09-09 12:00 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-09-09 12:43 am (UTC)Here, as an antidote if you have not seen it: Joan Acocella on Little Women. She ships Jo/Friedrich big time and I am delighted to see it in The New Yorker.
no subject
Date: 2018-09-11 01:09 am (UTC)Joan Acocella tells it like it is.
no subject
Date: 2018-09-11 07:29 pm (UTC)