I’ve already mentioned here that I have not read any Jane Austen books but I have watched Jane Austen movie adaptations.

This month I will be watching three of those adaptations with Erin from Still Life, With Cracker Crumbs but this week I watched Persuasion by myself to kick off Jane Austen January. If you want to get in on the movie-watching action or share posts about Jane in any capacity, you can add links at the link up, which you can find at the top of the page.

Today, I thought I’d offer you a little bit of a blow-by-blow of my thoughts as I watched the 2007 version of Persuasion but without spoilers. In other words, I will not share the ending of the film, even though it should be obvious how it ends because it is based on a Jane Austen book.

As the movie starts I can tell there are going to be a lot of close-ups on the actress who plays the main character – Anne Elliot (Sally Hawkins) and she will provide us many drawn-out contemplative and heartbroken expressions.

I also realize she’s the mom from the live-action Paddington movies. I realize this because she reminds me very much of the wife of a former pastor of mine and because my daughter loves the Paddington books and movies and we just watched Paddington 2 two weeks ago.

I already like the main character, though I do wish she had some more lines and less lackluster expressions. (Luckily – this changes later.)

Oh my, her father and sister are — how shall I put this? Horrid.

They are horrid.

Wait. Isn’t that the guy who was in Buffy the Vampire Slayer (which I only watched a couple of times) and Jonathan Creek and a bunch of other stuff I probably saw him in but can’t remember.

I don’t stop to look his name up but later my husband tells me his name is Anthony Head. I promptly forget what he told me and two hours later I look it up again.

Here are some exclamations I made each time the man opened his mouth as Sir Walter Elliot: “Wow.” “Okay then.” “Well, he’s certainly a jerk.” “Good. Leave her behind because who would want to be with you anyhow?” “Yikes. Pompous much?”

The sister, Elizabeth, deserves a lot of the same exclamations and she receives those and a couple of “yikes.”

Now the father and sister are leaving and their house will be rented out by someone who is not a nobleman but a mere commoner, as Sir Walter Stucky Up Face says. That makes him very sour indeed.

Our main character is being left behind – not of her own will, of course – to stay with her hypochondriac sister Mary Musgrove. Lord have mercy, this woman is a piece of work.

We’ve already heard before Anne stayed behind that the house that Anne grew up in but will not be able to stay in because her father has leased it out to commoners will be visited by a Captain Frederick Wentworth (Rupert Penry-Jones – what a very British name, eh?)

Cue yet another long, shocked yet subdued expression by Anne. Alas, she has met him before we learn as she talks to her godmother. It isn’t a spoiler to say that the captain wanted to marry dear Anne but her father and godmother forbade it.

Oh, Anne’s mother is dead, by the way. Just figured that out.

Is this sister for real? She’s sick? Now come on. Really?

Oh. I see. She’s only sick when she feels like it and not when fancy-dancy people come to visit and want her to go see other fancy-dancy people.

Listen, lady, your kid just fell out of a tree. Don’t you think that is more important than some fancy dinner?

Anne doesn’t think the dinner is more important. She’s staying home with your kid and cares more about your kid than you do.

Oh, so we learn that he sisters didn’t know of the proposal once long ago from the captain but of course, this hypochondriac one wouldn’t have known since she only thinks of herself.

The captain is dreamy by the way.

I can see why Anne wanted to marry him.

Everyone has got to be clueless to miss the swoony looks they keep giving each other and how sad the captain looks as he looks at Anne.

Oh. They are clueless because they are so incredibly self-centered.

Seriously, 20 minutes in and all I can think is how awful and selfish all these people are.

All except Anne, of course.

Here is where I will cut off my internal dialogue and leave a screenshot of what I told Erin about my thoughts as the movie neared the end:

The novel Persuasion was originally written in 1817. There are at least four movie adaptations of the novel with the latest being last year. I have not heard good things about the latest. I’ve heard the best things about this adaptation.

The movie was part of three movies released in 2007 by ITV. The other movies were Mansfield Park and Northanger Abby. According to Wikipedia, Hawkins wasn’t sure about playing in the movie when asked but after re-reading some of Jane’s books, including Persuasion, she fell in love with her again after last having read her in high school. She even went as far as reading about Jane herself to learn more about the woman behind the book.

She told The Independent, “Jane was an incredible woman. She was only in her early forties when she died. I became convinced that Persuasion was about her own love life; Anne Elliot took the wrong advice and left the man who turned out to be the love of her life. She is the type of woman you’d like to be: reserved, refined, funny. I totally fell in love with her.”

This was Penry-Jones’ first period drama. In an interview, he said, “In modern drama, everything is so overt. In period drama it’s all held in. You have to find ways to show the feelings straining beneath the surface.”

(An aside by me: he did a remarkable job with this.)

I found it interesting when I read on Wikipedia that the costumes made for the movie, along with those used in Miss Austen Regrets (which Erin and I will watch at the end of the month) were eventually sold by the Jane Austen Centre at an auction. The costume designer, Andrea Galer allowed the items to be sold but said it was a hard thing to do because she had loved designing those costumes so much. The costumes were already on display at the Jane Austen Centre, which is located in Bath, England and focuses on Jane’s time in Bath and how it influenced her novels, including Persuasion. Galer sold them to encourage others to get in touch with the materials that used to make clothes since she used a lot of those to design the costumes.

I have to be honest that it felt a little weird to read that they were sold on Ebay of all places. I’m not sure who the proceeds benefited but I would guess the center.

Have you seen this version of Persuasion or the others? Which was your favorite? Have you read the book and what did you think of it?

Next week Erin and I will be watching Sense and Sensibility and will write about it on Thursday.

Here is our complete list:

Movies and the dates we will be writing about them:

Sense and Sensibility – 1995 (January 11th)

Pride and Prejudice -2005 (January 18th)

Emma – 1996 (January 25th)

Miss Austen Regrets (February 1)