Pride and Prejudice redux

From the desk of The Movie Snob

Seeing the play of Pride & Prejudice recently spurred me to go back and reread the book and then to watch the DVD of the Keira Knightley version from 2005. Both were very enjoyable experiences. The book is simply a treat, and it has an advantage over the play in that you get occasional glimpses inside Mr. Darcy's head along the way. When you can only see his outward conduct, the plot really builds him up into such a jerk it is hard to change your opinion of him when the story calls for it. The movie is a little more successful at navigating this problem than the play because the camera can pause for a close-up of Darcy and give a hint at what he is thinking. The movie is very good, although it has to move very quickly in a few places to get everything in, and a viewer who is unfamiliar with the book is probably not going to easily and entirely understand how the characters get from point A to point B a couple of times. Also, I now see a bigger contrast between the book and the movie in the movie's focus on romantic love in the modern sense, while the book carefully builds the protagonists' love more on mutual respect and admiration than on romantic passion. Anyway, I highly recommend them both. I'm a little Pride & Prejudiced out right now, but eventually I'll have to watch the 5-hour A&E version starring Colin Firth (The Last Legion).