Review of Pride & Prejudice (2005) by Wayne K — 25 May 2018

Proving that sometimes a single 2-hour movie adaptation isn't enough to do a novel justice, Pride & Prejudice ends up being beautifully shot, well-acted but emotionally stunted. I admire the talent involved, and for me Donald Sutherland was the absolute best thing about it.

His sense of humour, his ease at shifting between moods, the way he interacts with his onscreen family, I thought he was great. Unfortunately, as becomes quickly apparent, there's a reason this worked better as a 6-part miniseries than as a feature film.

The novel is long and complex in its exploration of societal expectations and how a person can be blinded by the words of its title. Darcy's gradual emotional shift is very abrupt, as he jumps from looking down his nose at Elizabeth to expressing his love for her so quickly that it just comes across as rushed and unconvincing.

Also Mr. Darcy's expression changes little throughout the film, suggesting either the actor has trouble smiling or the Director told him not too. Also it suffers that problem endemic to films based in England in this time period, in that characters use twice as many words as necessary to say very simple things, such as 'It would be most inappropriate of you to accept such an impertinent invitation' rather than 'No you shouldn't.

' It might sound like I'm dogpiling on the film, but it's still a nice watch. It just fails to live up to the standards of its source material, but given the time constraints, it's understandable.

And since very few movies live up to the books on which they're based, Pride & Prejudice deserves credit for making the best effort it could.