BBC - 1, Working Title - 0

Last night I had the privilege of using free tickets to see an advance screening of “Pride and Prejudice”, courtesy of the San Francisco Spinsters (no, I’m not a member, thank you very much). My friend Rana and I lined up with a gaggle of 300 or so giggling 25-35 year old women (OK, we giggled a little too, I admit it) and the question on everyone’s lips was, duh! – will this movie be as good as the BBC version of the movie?

The Scene
Before giving you my (humble) opinion on the movie, let me set the stage for you. We filed into the good old AMC Van Ness theatre #10 a good 45 minutes early and sat ourselves next to Token, a kindly gentleman who looked to be in his mid-40s and was for a brief moment one of the only two men in the entire theatre. (Another boy-man of 24 or so appeared about 5 minutes later with his girlfriend. Good God, man, do you shop at Benefit with her too?). Anyway, after 3 seconds of chatting my gaydar confirmed that Token was completely straight and somehow he and his movie-reviewing female companion were supposed to be seeing “Chicken Little” at the same time at the Kabuki. Movie Reviewer got wind of the mistake and pulled him by the arm out of the theatre saying something like “there is NO WAY I’m staying in this theatre to see THAT movie with all these GIRLS!” I was briefly insulted then realized that she was glaring at me for chatting it up with Token. And then I was briefly delighted at being called a “girl”. Tee-hee, giggle, giggle.

Shortly after that, Rana and I and the rest of the audience experienced an Oprah moment when we each got giant gift bags full of full-sized Bliss products -!!- and a cute lil baby tee that anyone over 5’4” will most certainly have to stretch over a chair to wear that says “Mrs. Darcy” on it. (I feel sad that Token missed out on this.) If this is buttering up, Working Title, consider me fully buttered and ready.

The Hullabaloo
Before I tell you what I thought (as if the title didn’t give it away) I have to say, if you haven’t read “Pride and Prejudice”, then you should be flogged. I love reading and I love reading Jane Austen so it’s hard for me to understand why self-respecting, smart women who also like to read and especially LOVED “Bridget Jones Diary” (the book and the movie) cannot also sit themselves down and read the Real McCoy. It’s an excellent read. In fact, it’s a page-fucking-turner. Janie A. is brilliant, funny, clever and witty. Her words are beautiful and she’s a master of details and no detail can be ignored because it adds an important layer to the story somewhere down the line. But my blog is a safe, welcoming place, so if you haven’t read it, that’s cool. Just please promise me you will someday. Once your brain adjusts to the language, you’ll be in…. hook, line and sinker.

In 1995, the BBC produced a 6-hour sheer-fucking-genius mini-series version of “Pride”, much to the chagrin of men everywhere. It was so long because it was absolutely true to the book, a fact I’m sure many film snobs in the world thought was the wrong way to go due to the fact that movie people like to do their own creative version of stuff. Understood. (Although I say bollocks to that). To me, it was perfectly cast and the locations, houses and details within were incredible. The period experts also say that the dancing, costumes, hairstyles and make-up were also spot-on. All of a sudden, people who’d never read the book picked it up because the movie was just that fricking good. When does that happen? When is the movie as good as the book? Almost never. Well done, BBC peeps.

…and finally, the movie
So the poor bastards at Working Title had a tough row to hoe (as my dearly departed Grandmother might’ve said) going into this one. If you’ve never read the book or seen the movie, you’ll probably really like this version. You won’t know that you’ve missed out on 75% of the details and back-story that make this one of the greatest books ever written. You’ll miss out on watching the development of one of the steamiest, most sexually tense, love/hate relationships of all time. You won’t get to see the relationship between Elizabeth and her oldest sister Jane (which the real Jane would have hated…that’s an important part of all her books). In fact, you won’t get to see any of the characters really develop enough to care as much about them as you do in the book or in the BBC version. You won’t catch it when the writers slide in some random, non-Jane Austen period speak-ese in order to compensate for time and catch you up. And you won’t be annoyed by the super cheesy ending.

You WILL see Dame Judy Dench playing a fucking brilliant Lady De Bourg. And Tom as an excellent nervous, smarmy little Mr. Collins. Everyone else is fine. And not “fine” in the British compliment kind of way, just “fine” as in OK. Lots of Keira Knightly looking pensive, smiling big with her tongue between her front teeth to show how girlish and full of life she is. Lots of really beautiful people with huge, luminous eyes (what causes that? Is this a coincidence?) Jenna Malone, as annoying as she is to me, actually pulled off a good Lydia, maybe because Lydia, that dumb scandalous whore, is just so fucking annoying. And Bingley’s sister – SCARY – she could seamlessly have gone from 1850s England to 2005 San Francisco and pulled off a bitchy milkmaid look down in the Triangle, no problem.

Last but not least, Matthew MacFayden as Mr. Darcy. He really didn’t bother me. I can’t say he was Colin, but he wasn’t bad. Got me at the end a little. But he didn’t really get a chance to shine with the limited time so it’s hard to say.

All in all, I say see it. If you love the other movie and the book, you won’t feel good until you see this one. I’m still convinced that even the worst cast of actors (me, the guy at Starbucks on Union and the #7 bus driver) could get together, read this and pull off a masterpiece simply because of the brilliance of Jane’s words. I’d love to know what other people thought, both people who’ve never read or seen anything else and people who are tainted like me. Anyone?

Note to Typepad users: I just tried 7 times to post a photo of Colin Firth. See? The free service sucks too.