No wonder you are not a RT critic. Just a whole heap of rambling, you are not even a great writer and to think you have the audacity to critique others is embarrassing.
Preach. I read this entire review out loud to my partner, their daughter did her graduate thesis on Austen, and we thought it much worse than sitting through Netflix’s Persuasion last night. Labeling it a hate crime is absurd. No one need to take you seriously because you are doing that enough yourself.
I think this probably the biggest movie bringing diversity to period drama to date along with Bridgerton, so this long piece sounding like a temper tantrum, but bravo job at keeping the Jane Austen Karen Fanclub alive and well. Whether you want to admit it or not a lot of the negative commentary make it feel it's toward the film not being completely white and I thought okay maybe it's just the direction and screenplay, but when I deep dive and seeing how Jane Austen Karen Fanclub hated the diversity in Bridgerton, it gave me all the fact I needed to come to the conclusion this white gatekeeping fanclub is completely racist.
Did you actually read this piece? Brandon thoughtfully outlined why he felt the movie was a poor adaptation of the source material and your response is that he is against "diversity." How?
I don't understand how keeping things historically accurate when portrayed on screen is considered racist. It's history. An attempt to rewrite it through casting changes nothing, but it certainly doesn't mean those who prefer the historical version are all racists. I didn't live in that era, however, I understand the era and the thoughts and reality of it. Changing reality does nothing to change the history - it distorts it and tries to imply something it is not. I believe it's better to learn from history than try to rewrite it because some find it painful. We are not gatekeepers - we are realists.
How is that racist? Putting black people into supporting roles as british nobles in a period costume drama is silly and completely meaningless. Would you really not watch a movie if it didn't contain anachronisms to placate the non historically inclined? Why not set it in modern times and make the primary heroine black? It's like Netflix is trying to please everyone with their tokenism and fails at pleasing anyone.
There were some Black British people alive and part of the ton in the Georgian and Regency periods, who have until recently been largely excluded from historical accounts and fictional Regency narratives. Even if there hadn't been, there is plenty of room – and desire! – for a bit of alternate history that's inclusive of the broad international spectrum of Austen fans. Austen renders her time/place/circumstances beautifully, but her work is not a documentary, and there would be nothing so terrible about "anachronisms" (although again, Black Britains popping up in her work isn't anachronistic). Racially gatekeeping the entire Regency period is ahistorical and seems designed to shut people out. I do agree that I'd like to see more Black British people in the lead role in costume dramas, rather than occupying supporting roles.
There were more black people in 18th Century England then there were members of the ton, but those black people weren't aristocrats. The good news is you don't have to be an aristocrat to be worth writing about or depicting on film, and stories about everyone else from that time period, black or white, are still waiting to be told.
Exactly. There were 20 Dukes, 6 Marquis, 40 Earls and thousands of black people living in England in the 18th Century. Romance writers have managed to write endlessly about those 68 aristocratic men, so obviously there is a lot of room to tell stories set in the 18th Century about those few thousand black people, it just means telling stories about the people who were not at the top of society, not going to balls, not dripping in diamonds, not stepping into a carriage. It feels to me as though "Harlots" is a lesson in how to "do diversity" well in historical drama, and "Bridgeton" (pretending the Queen was black, random extremely handsome black Dukes who wear blue and dance at balls even though they are supposed to be in mourning) is exactly how not to "do diversity". It's insulting to the lives of actual 18th C black people. I would love to read a well written 18th C romance novel or TV series with a fabulous, dreamy, black hero, but he'd better be a privateer, a navy captain, or a Dukes bastard son, not a Duke, and he'd better face some racism. I don't see how that gets in the way of telling a fabulous and romantic story. If you want a dashing black Duke who doesn't face racism, then make up a fantasy world where those are the rules. Ursula Le Guinn and Kate Elliot have both done something similar and knocked it out of the park.
I totally agree. The series Frontier tells a story of the great unknown historic person with expertise. Educational, informative and damned interesting with all the horror and drama expected of a good story.
Do that. It's believable, whereas most of this progressive diversity messaging crap feels forced and phony.
I haven't seen the movie, so I have no idea if the cast is almost entirely black or white or somewhere in between. I got no feeling from this review that the criticisms have anything whatsoever to do with the way people look. It's how they act and emote feelings, which suck. Your comment makes zero sense to me.
The review says nothing about race. But to address your point, how would you like to see a Black Panther movie and randomly inserted white nobles into Wakanda? Even though that's also fiction, wouldn't that be odd? A modern adaptation of Persuasion would totally be cool, and why didn't netflix go all the way and make the protagonist black? It's like "we value token diversity, but that would be going too far".
Like idk if I want diversity in a period drama in the form of erasure of racism... i know brown people are pretty to look at but can we talk about how upper class Victorian society was built off exploited and colonize brown ppl? And the transatlantic slave trade instead? Like if we _really_ wanted diversity, there would be a radical shift towards these uncomfortable narratives? Lol
I read and loved Persuasion at your recommendation, and have been ranting about the trailer for this silly little movie to anyone who would listen.
I came of age reading the child wizard books, and subsequently complaining about things being left off the books, and now I understand that the text was very much respected even if my favorite side stories didn’t make the script.
Persuasion is such a beautiful and melancholic romance, and the cheap Fleabag attempt of it all was never ever going to work. Clueless is a clever interpretation, and I didn’t know Bridget Jones was too! What I’ve come to love about Austen is how the humanity of her characters and the places they find themselves in feels interchangeably timeless but also of its time. The themes of Persuasion are also ever present in relationships today that I don’t understand how the many people it takes to make a movie missed it. Blew past every turn and sign post, and just drove right over Henry Holding’s Austen debut. It’s upsetting.
Anyway, thank you for writing this but also just writing all that you do.
‘Where it goes wrong is when the adaptation betrays a lack of interest or real understanding of the source material’ - this!! It’s nothing to do with gatekeeping. A good adaptation will highlight the relevance of the themes and ideas in the original work. I love She’s the Man & what it does with Twelfth Night.
When I showed my English lit teacher mum (mega Austen fan) the trailer, she just looked blank and said she couldn’t even be mad bc it seemed to bear no relation to the novel whatsoever. It’s almost like the writers hadn’t read it.
I think Cate Eland summed it up so well when she talked about society’s distaste for complicated, angry and bitter heroines. Why do we have to iron out Anne’s inner turmoil to make her worthy of screen-time? And all the more hurtful when you take into account what Austen’s life was like when she wrote it.
She also peed on a tree during the “long walk” with the Musgroves and Wentworth. So a winking, peeing, verbally-incontinent Anne Elliot with gravy on her head.
"This script is mediocre, but more than that, it just has no understanding of the source material. None of the character motivations make any sense." I think THIS is most painful aspect for me, because I'm afraid people will then see Persuasion and Austen through this lens
This makes me so unhappy! Like ‘the unhappiest I’ve been since I unfortunately forced myself to watch the second half of the tv adaptation of Sanditon’ unhappy! Persuasion is also my favorite Austen (and Northanger Abbey is her worst. Don’t fight me; facts), and I was so looking forward to seeing it! Because while Dakota is in fact not a great actor, like, maybe she could be? And Henry Golding is? And Richard Grant is always utterly brilliant? You have ruined my dreams, and the worst part is that I’ll most likely watch the damn thing anyway, and then regret not just trusting you.
This was great and I don’t think I’d be able to watch this ironically like it was Yellowstone! Persuasion was one of the last books I was able to read in one sitting before my brain broke and the letter haunts me and for everything to pan out the way it did is just big yikes!
I think the BBC adaptation of North and South is one of the only ones I’ve seen that has been able to properly adapt the a story that has romance and commentary on class without forgetting the latter.
The BBC adaptation of Persuasion, with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds, is good too. Understated, well acted, well-written, with the right accent on class vs personal feelings.
Absolutely my favorite adaptation! Amanda Root and ciaran Hinds! They need to bring it out again to counter this grotesque Fleabagization of Persuasion. Brandon, you have said something profound in your review; It was about the book and why you loved it.
I am trying to comprehend where, who, what and how is anyone forcing you to watch Dakota Johnson? Hundreds of actors to choose from, yet you cry about the one you don’t like. Make it make sense.
This is a brilliant review, I agree with all your opinions (except maybe that I do like Matthew M as Darcy except for when he has to act unsure of himself -like when he sees Lizzie at his estate).
On an aside, I also love Bridget Jones, and one thing I love about the book is that it plays well with the gap between how people represent themselves when writing about them and their lives on a diary (or something like this) and how other people see them, and I love that.
On another aside, I’d love to know which Persuasion adaptation is your favorite one, and what is your top something of JA’s adaptations. And also, which books are your favorites!!
Your pain at the end of this review was so visceral, I'm experiencing it second-hand. Which is the only way I'm going to experience this (nightmare? travesty? perversion? incomprehensible refashioning?) version of Austen's work. Anne Elliott as a snarky wine-drunk motormouth. The mind reels. (I did enjoy Fire Island and wonder if you did, as well).
The reason the filmmakers made the movie this way is because they didn't adapt Jane Austen's PERSUASION for the screen. They made a movie called "Jane Austen's PERSUASION" to lure in people who recognize the IP and want the experience of Austen without the effort of reading her, a group vastly larger than those who have read her. In addition the experience, that is, what's in the movie is irrelevant so long as the viewer thinks they're more high-brow at the end. It's a classic comic book of a movie.
You see the same thing happening on movies like HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY and READY PLAYER ONE, which are both unfilmable by Hollywood standards today and thus had to have other films made to fit their titles. But so long as the titles put butts in the seats for the first week...
I watched this specifically so I could better enjoy this essay. That and I have covid and nothing better to do.
You are bang on, of course! I don't even hate Dakota Johnson, I'm pretty sure she did what she was directed to do, it was just so misguided and unnecessary from the start.
Biggest thing was, even with good casting, acting, costumes, etc, it was so FLAT. e.g. Anne's father is one of the funniest characters ever, and he was wasted here. And I'll never forgive the delivery of THAT letter.
No wonder you are not a RT critic. Just a whole heap of rambling, you are not even a great writer and to think you have the audacity to critique others is embarrassing.
Hmm, I thought the review—really a review essay—is so well written I’m going to use it as an assignment in my nonfiction class
Preach. I read this entire review out loud to my partner, their daughter did her graduate thesis on Austen, and we thought it much worse than sitting through Netflix’s Persuasion last night. Labeling it a hate crime is absurd. No one need to take you seriously because you are doing that enough yourself.
You’re hilarious.
I think this probably the biggest movie bringing diversity to period drama to date along with Bridgerton, so this long piece sounding like a temper tantrum, but bravo job at keeping the Jane Austen Karen Fanclub alive and well. Whether you want to admit it or not a lot of the negative commentary make it feel it's toward the film not being completely white and I thought okay maybe it's just the direction and screenplay, but when I deep dive and seeing how Jane Austen Karen Fanclub hated the diversity in Bridgerton, it gave me all the fact I needed to come to the conclusion this white gatekeeping fanclub is completely racist.
Did you actually read this piece? Brandon thoughtfully outlined why he felt the movie was a poor adaptation of the source material and your response is that he is against "diversity." How?
Having diversity in these pieces is great, making a hash of Austen's actual novel? Not so great.
This!!!!!!!!!!!
I don't understand how keeping things historically accurate when portrayed on screen is considered racist. It's history. An attempt to rewrite it through casting changes nothing, but it certainly doesn't mean those who prefer the historical version are all racists. I didn't live in that era, however, I understand the era and the thoughts and reality of it. Changing reality does nothing to change the history - it distorts it and tries to imply something it is not. I believe it's better to learn from history than try to rewrite it because some find it painful. We are not gatekeepers - we are realists.
Oh that is kind of racist, lol.
How is that racist? Putting black people into supporting roles as british nobles in a period costume drama is silly and completely meaningless. Would you really not watch a movie if it didn't contain anachronisms to placate the non historically inclined? Why not set it in modern times and make the primary heroine black? It's like Netflix is trying to please everyone with their tokenism and fails at pleasing anyone.
There were some Black British people alive and part of the ton in the Georgian and Regency periods, who have until recently been largely excluded from historical accounts and fictional Regency narratives. Even if there hadn't been, there is plenty of room – and desire! – for a bit of alternate history that's inclusive of the broad international spectrum of Austen fans. Austen renders her time/place/circumstances beautifully, but her work is not a documentary, and there would be nothing so terrible about "anachronisms" (although again, Black Britains popping up in her work isn't anachronistic). Racially gatekeeping the entire Regency period is ahistorical and seems designed to shut people out. I do agree that I'd like to see more Black British people in the lead role in costume dramas, rather than occupying supporting roles.
There were more black people in 18th Century England then there were members of the ton, but those black people weren't aristocrats. The good news is you don't have to be an aristocrat to be worth writing about or depicting on film, and stories about everyone else from that time period, black or white, are still waiting to be told.
No, don't think it is really.
Exactly. There were 20 Dukes, 6 Marquis, 40 Earls and thousands of black people living in England in the 18th Century. Romance writers have managed to write endlessly about those 68 aristocratic men, so obviously there is a lot of room to tell stories set in the 18th Century about those few thousand black people, it just means telling stories about the people who were not at the top of society, not going to balls, not dripping in diamonds, not stepping into a carriage. It feels to me as though "Harlots" is a lesson in how to "do diversity" well in historical drama, and "Bridgeton" (pretending the Queen was black, random extremely handsome black Dukes who wear blue and dance at balls even though they are supposed to be in mourning) is exactly how not to "do diversity". It's insulting to the lives of actual 18th C black people. I would love to read a well written 18th C romance novel or TV series with a fabulous, dreamy, black hero, but he'd better be a privateer, a navy captain, or a Dukes bastard son, not a Duke, and he'd better face some racism. I don't see how that gets in the way of telling a fabulous and romantic story. If you want a dashing black Duke who doesn't face racism, then make up a fantasy world where those are the rules. Ursula Le Guinn and Kate Elliot have both done something similar and knocked it out of the park.
How does this affect reparations, I wonder?
I totally agree. The series Frontier tells a story of the great unknown historic person with expertise. Educational, informative and damned interesting with all the horror and drama expected of a good story.
Do that. It's believable, whereas most of this progressive diversity messaging crap feels forced and phony.
I agree.
In the modern Anne's words, this whole movie sucks, like an octopus.
I haven't seen the movie, so I have no idea if the cast is almost entirely black or white or somewhere in between. I got no feeling from this review that the criticisms have anything whatsoever to do with the way people look. It's how they act and emote feelings, which suck. Your comment makes zero sense to me.
Tell me you did not read the article without telling me you did not read the article
all the Jane Austen fans I know have been eagerly waiting for Mr Malcom's List but keep not engaging with any of the actual criticism here i guess…………
The review says nothing about race. But to address your point, how would you like to see a Black Panther movie and randomly inserted white nobles into Wakanda? Even though that's also fiction, wouldn't that be odd? A modern adaptation of Persuasion would totally be cool, and why didn't netflix go all the way and make the protagonist black? It's like "we value token diversity, but that would be going too far".
This comment made me feel like I was trapped in a bad imitation of the Neville Shunt sketch.
https://youtu.be/J8nDDB2APAM
elm
welp
Like idk if I want diversity in a period drama in the form of erasure of racism... i know brown people are pretty to look at but can we talk about how upper class Victorian society was built off exploited and colonize brown ppl? And the transatlantic slave trade instead? Like if we _really_ wanted diversity, there would be a radical shift towards these uncomfortable narratives? Lol
Bridgerton fan? Gtfo lmao find better things to do than hate read & spam comment. Lord.
Think you're just ticked off he didn't like 2005 P&P and AnnaK.
The one true 2022 Persuasion adaptation is Our Flag Means Death
I don’t know about that. The one I watch over and over stars Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds.
Me too. I love that version ❤️
I loved this whole essay so much I am putting a line in my will requesting it as my epitaph.
I read and loved Persuasion at your recommendation, and have been ranting about the trailer for this silly little movie to anyone who would listen.
I came of age reading the child wizard books, and subsequently complaining about things being left off the books, and now I understand that the text was very much respected even if my favorite side stories didn’t make the script.
Persuasion is such a beautiful and melancholic romance, and the cheap Fleabag attempt of it all was never ever going to work. Clueless is a clever interpretation, and I didn’t know Bridget Jones was too! What I’ve come to love about Austen is how the humanity of her characters and the places they find themselves in feels interchangeably timeless but also of its time. The themes of Persuasion are also ever present in relationships today that I don’t understand how the many people it takes to make a movie missed it. Blew past every turn and sign post, and just drove right over Henry Holding’s Austen debut. It’s upsetting.
Anyway, thank you for writing this but also just writing all that you do.
Thank you for subjecting yourself to this movie so the rest of us don’t have to.
Guarantee you will watch it. I don’t even know why attempt to post a false comment.
You’re very hungry for attention lol
‘Where it goes wrong is when the adaptation betrays a lack of interest or real understanding of the source material’ - this!! It’s nothing to do with gatekeeping. A good adaptation will highlight the relevance of the themes and ideas in the original work. I love She’s the Man & what it does with Twelfth Night.
When I showed my English lit teacher mum (mega Austen fan) the trailer, she just looked blank and said she couldn’t even be mad bc it seemed to bear no relation to the novel whatsoever. It’s almost like the writers hadn’t read it.
I think Cate Eland summed it up so well when she talked about society’s distaste for complicated, angry and bitter heroines. Why do we have to iron out Anne’s inner turmoil to make her worthy of screen-time? And all the more hurtful when you take into account what Austen’s life was like when she wrote it.
A WINKY Anne Elliott?? 😤😤😤
She also peed on a tree during the “long walk” with the Musgroves and Wentworth. So a winking, peeing, verbally-incontinent Anne Elliot with gravy on her head.
So weird, right??
"This script is mediocre, but more than that, it just has no understanding of the source material. None of the character motivations make any sense." I think THIS is most painful aspect for me, because I'm afraid people will then see Persuasion and Austen through this lens
This makes me so unhappy! Like ‘the unhappiest I’ve been since I unfortunately forced myself to watch the second half of the tv adaptation of Sanditon’ unhappy! Persuasion is also my favorite Austen (and Northanger Abbey is her worst. Don’t fight me; facts), and I was so looking forward to seeing it! Because while Dakota is in fact not a great actor, like, maybe she could be? And Henry Golding is? And Richard Grant is always utterly brilliant? You have ruined my dreams, and the worst part is that I’ll most likely watch the damn thing anyway, and then regret not just trusting you.
Also I love your writing, cheers :)
This was great and I don’t think I’d be able to watch this ironically like it was Yellowstone! Persuasion was one of the last books I was able to read in one sitting before my brain broke and the letter haunts me and for everything to pan out the way it did is just big yikes!
I think the BBC adaptation of North and South is one of the only ones I’ve seen that has been able to properly adapt the a story that has romance and commentary on class without forgetting the latter.
The BBC adaptation of Persuasion, with Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds, is good too. Understated, well acted, well-written, with the right accent on class vs personal feelings.
Absolutely my favorite adaptation! Amanda Root and ciaran Hinds! They need to bring it out again to counter this grotesque Fleabagization of Persuasion. Brandon, you have said something profound in your review; It was about the book and why you loved it.
Ohhh, North and South. Yes.
The film industry needs to overcome its collective delusion that Dakota Johnson is a good actor. We will all be better for it.
I am trying to comprehend where, who, what and how is anyone forcing you to watch Dakota Johnson? Hundreds of actors to choose from, yet you cry about the one you don’t like. Make it make sense.
This is a brilliant review, I agree with all your opinions (except maybe that I do like Matthew M as Darcy except for when he has to act unsure of himself -like when he sees Lizzie at his estate).
On an aside, I also love Bridget Jones, and one thing I love about the book is that it plays well with the gap between how people represent themselves when writing about them and their lives on a diary (or something like this) and how other people see them, and I love that.
On another aside, I’d love to know which Persuasion adaptation is your favorite one, and what is your top something of JA’s adaptations. And also, which books are your favorites!!
Your pain at the end of this review was so visceral, I'm experiencing it second-hand. Which is the only way I'm going to experience this (nightmare? travesty? perversion? incomprehensible refashioning?) version of Austen's work. Anne Elliott as a snarky wine-drunk motormouth. The mind reels. (I did enjoy Fire Island and wonder if you did, as well).
I thought Fire Island was a great Austen adaptation! It definitely understood the source material.
This! It perfectly understands how P&P works while transposing it into queer culture.
The reason the filmmakers made the movie this way is because they didn't adapt Jane Austen's PERSUASION for the screen. They made a movie called "Jane Austen's PERSUASION" to lure in people who recognize the IP and want the experience of Austen without the effort of reading her, a group vastly larger than those who have read her. In addition the experience, that is, what's in the movie is irrelevant so long as the viewer thinks they're more high-brow at the end. It's a classic comic book of a movie.
You see the same thing happening on movies like HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY and READY PLAYER ONE, which are both unfilmable by Hollywood standards today and thus had to have other films made to fit their titles. But so long as the titles put butts in the seats for the first week...
I watched this specifically so I could better enjoy this essay. That and I have covid and nothing better to do.
You are bang on, of course! I don't even hate Dakota Johnson, I'm pretty sure she did what she was directed to do, it was just so misguided and unnecessary from the start.
Biggest thing was, even with good casting, acting, costumes, etc, it was so FLAT. e.g. Anne's father is one of the funniest characters ever, and he was wasted here. And I'll never forgive the delivery of THAT letter.
Touche! Get well soon.