Мой первый журнал SUNRISE November № 1 2018 | Page 54
FILM REVIEW
A Look Without Prejudice
perfect for the role. In fact, there were
“attempts” to make screen versions of
Austen's novel in 1938, 1952, 1968, 1980 and 1995,
but only the 2005 version, according to the
critics, conveyed the atmosphere most
accurately that had been felt by the author
herself, and a great contribution to it was
made by Keira Knightley who often compared
herself to the main heroine and confessed
that she had dreamed to play that role for a
long time.
Perhaps many people will think now that
there is nothing to be expected from the film
except romanticism and maybe some tearful
drama, but you are greatly mistaken. This is
what film criticism has been created for, to
make people either open or close their eyes to
elementary things. I'd like to open the people's
eyes to this film even wider as it really deserves
it.
The action of the novel takes place in
1797, it is the year when Jane Austen wrote the
first variant of her work, which was initially
titled First Impressions, and that's the book
that Elizabeth is reading in the beginning of
the film. The amount spent on the production
of the movie was about 28 million dollars, and it
collected approximately 121 million dollars. The
film can really be praised for the excellent
music and splendid costumes that convey the
realities of that era very accurately. It was
shot entirely in Great Britain, with real
historical manors taken as the base, and no
additional motion picture architecture used.
For example, the role of Longbourne, the
Bennets' ancestral manor, was played by a
17th century manor, Groombridge, surrounded
with green meadows and with a view of a valley
and vineyards. Frankly speaking, as I was
looking at all those picturesque places I had a
great desire to immerse into the atmosphere
of that era, maybe even to play a game of
exchanging glances with Mr. Darcy once… Who
knows? It seems to me that any young girl who
has watched this film will surely want to
become Elizabeth at least for a pair of short
moments, and to dream how her own Darcy
would give her a huge library of the world's
rarest books, where one of them would be
probably about their own love… But why do I
keep calling him Mr. Darcy all the time? I'd bet
you anything, many of you didn't have even a
slightest idea of this mysterious character's
name, or did you? For those who haven't yet
read the book but will probably read it in a
short while, it will be a totally unexpected
thing, the same as it was once for me though,
that his name was Fitzwilliam Darcy! Indeed,
such plot turns can happen in literature too…
The whole point was that the director and
script writers didn't want to use Mr. Darcy's
first name in the script just because another
character of the novel, Mr. Wickham, had the
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same first name. His first name isn't
mentioned in the film at all, he is presented as
s o m e k i n d o f a n a m e l e s s h e r o, b u t
nevertheless, to avoid this confusion, the
script writers took an unanimous decision to
exclude both of these names from the
previously planned script. I think this made
perfect sense and was quite necessary
because many people had not read the novel
by the time when the film was released, and
some people had no idea that it existed at all.
As I'm getting to the end of this very
interesting story that I don't want to end, I'd
like to note that Austen's world pulls like a
magnet, as if fearing to lose the last reader,
the last spectator… There's no doubt about it,
this movie was an inspiration for me! First of all,
it let me understand that pride is sometimes
much weaker than love, and love can be more
secretive than pride itself. We shouldn't also
forget another word, which sounds as
“prejudice”. I'll give my readers a short
explanation about the meaning of this word
and the role it plays in the entire movie.
Elizabeth uses pride as her best trait, in other
words, as her self-esteem and self-respect,
which don't let her come down lower than the
established principles and ideals, while Darcy
prefers prejudice. Prejudice is a sort of biased
negative opinion of someone. In fact, there
were attempts for some time to compare
these two interesting words, many people said
that they had been used to add a trace of
sadness to the novel, but luckily this opinion
wasn't shared by everyone! As the entire plot
is unravelling we can see the struggle of these
two traits, but ultimately both of them turn
out to be forceless when love emerges in the
hearts.
Unfortunately, my dear readers, it would
have been time for me to finish, but
fortunately, my work allows me to recapitulate
all that I have written above. This film isn't right
only for those people who love the classics, it
is suitable and right for every and all of us.
Perhaps this phrase will sound banal, but I
believe I must pronounce it. With all the
warmth of my heart and soul, I declare that
without this film I'd have lost the hope at all for
the real and delicate feeling of love, which
maybe comes to some people at a later time. I
feel that I want to believe the characters, and
thanks to the actors' brilliant performance,
the lines I have read come to life in new colors
of poetry and feelings. What Austen makes us
understand with this wonderful story is that
Pride and Prejudice are the base of all bases,
and the film was constructed only thanks to
them. No words, no film, no play—perhaps this
is what Jane Austen herself would say. At such
an inspiring note, I'm saying goodbye and will
look forward to seeing you again in the next
issue.
November 2018 №1