LITTLE WOMEN
****
Director: Greta Gerwig
Screenwriter: Greta Gerwig, based on the novel by Louisa May Alcott.
Principal cast:
Saoirse Ronan
Emma Watson
Florence Pugh
Eliza Scanlen
Laura Dern
Meryl Streep
Timothée Chalamet
Country: USA
Classification: G
Runtime: 135 mins.
Australian release date: Wednesday 1 January 2020
Previewed at: Sony Theatrette, Sydney, on Wednesday 27 November 2019.
Greta Gerwig, the director of last year’s winner of the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture (Musical or Comedy), Lady Bird, has again turned her hand to a film about women coming-of-age, their personal values and intimate relationships. This time it’s turf that been well covered before, Louisa May Alcott’s 1868/69 novel Little Women, already made for the cinema on six previous occasions, beginning in 1917. Gerwig’s is the third adaptation to be directed by a woman; she was preceded by Gillian Armstrong in 1994 and Clare Niederpruem, whose contemporary version of the story debuted in 2018. It is material that is well-suited to a female at the helm and Gerwig has done great work with both the script and the direction. It’s no surprise, then, to learn that she has been nursing this project in her heart of hearts for many years.
An on-screen card at the film’s start quotes Alcott as saying, “I’ve had lots of troubles, so I write jolly tales,” and Little Women is, indeed, a jolly tale. The March family is comprised completely of females because the husband and father of these women and girls (Bob Odenkirk) is off doing his duty in the Civil War. Which leaves Marmee (Laura Dern) raising their four daughters, Jo (Saoirse Ronan), Meg (Emma Watson), Amy (Florence Pugh) and Beth (Australian actress Eliza Scanlen), with just the help of their live-in cook and maid Hannah (Jayne Houdyshell), who’s treated like another member of the family. All the girls exhibit artistic traits: Jo wants to be a writer, Meg an actress, Amy a painter and Beth a musician, but they are aware that, in reality, they will probably have to sacrifice these dreams for marriage, in keeping with the social mores of the period. Only Jo is driven enough to eschew matrimony in favour of a professional career as a novelist and she refuses to be dissuaded from her goal, even when her publisher, Mr. Dashwood (Tracy Letts), instructs her that if her main character is female then she “must be dead or married” at her story’s end. Such is the fate of women. The film charts the destiny of these people as they suffer ‘the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune’ over a number of years, documenting their lives as the girls grow into women.
Gerwig’s screenplay for Little Women is superb, beautifully portraying the semi-chaotic life of the household as the girls play, fight, argue and make-up, their words tumbling out as they jostle for space, talking over each other at rapid speed as if they only have so long to be heard. These scenes are well-designed and choreographed, too, and they often spill over from one room to another, all caught in long takes by the lens of French cinematographer Yorick Le Saux. The film looks splendid throughout but there is one scene in particular that is simply breathtaking, when Jo takes the ill Beth to the coast for a break. It could have been painted by one of the great Impressionists, the lighting and framing ably capturing both the beauty of the scene and the pathos of the situation. The ensemble cast is uniformly excellent so it’s hard to single out any one performer as all the actors have their particular talents, but one suspects that Ronan will be on the list of Oscar nominees next year. Having been nominated for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role twice before, perhaps it’ll be case of third time lucky for her effort here. She’s fabulous. The movie’s production values and costume design are exemplary as well, and Alexandre Desplat’s score magnificently augments the great classical music used on the soundtrack.
Little Women is, in Gerwig’s hands, a powerful statement about female empowerment that’s as relevant today as it was when it was first written. As Laura Dern put it, “It’s a story about identity and there’s nothing more modern than that. We still struggle today with how to ask, ‘who am I, and how, despite everyone else’s opinion, am I going to stand true to that in my life?’ - yet that’s what Louisa May Alcott wrote about 150 years ago. Part of the beauty of what Alcott did is that she established strength as independence, as art, as ambition but also as marriage and parenting, and Greta invites the audience to engage with all of that.”
Screenwriter: Greta Gerwig, based on the novel by Louisa May Alcott.
Principal cast:
Saoirse Ronan
Emma Watson
Florence Pugh
Eliza Scanlen
Laura Dern
Meryl Streep
Timothée Chalamet
Country: USA
Classification: G
Runtime: 135 mins.
Australian release date: Wednesday 1 January 2020
Previewed at: Sony Theatrette, Sydney, on Wednesday 27 November 2019.
Greta Gerwig, the director of last year’s winner of the Golden Globe for Best Motion Picture (Musical or Comedy), Lady Bird, has again turned her hand to a film about women coming-of-age, their personal values and intimate relationships. This time it’s turf that been well covered before, Louisa May Alcott’s 1868/69 novel Little Women, already made for the cinema on six previous occasions, beginning in 1917. Gerwig’s is the third adaptation to be directed by a woman; she was preceded by Gillian Armstrong in 1994 and Clare Niederpruem, whose contemporary version of the story debuted in 2018. It is material that is well-suited to a female at the helm and Gerwig has done great work with both the script and the direction. It’s no surprise, then, to learn that she has been nursing this project in her heart of hearts for many years.
An on-screen card at the film’s start quotes Alcott as saying, “I’ve had lots of troubles, so I write jolly tales,” and Little Women is, indeed, a jolly tale. The March family is comprised completely of females because the husband and father of these women and girls (Bob Odenkirk) is off doing his duty in the Civil War. Which leaves Marmee (Laura Dern) raising their four daughters, Jo (Saoirse Ronan), Meg (Emma Watson), Amy (Florence Pugh) and Beth (Australian actress Eliza Scanlen), with just the help of their live-in cook and maid Hannah (Jayne Houdyshell), who’s treated like another member of the family. All the girls exhibit artistic traits: Jo wants to be a writer, Meg an actress, Amy a painter and Beth a musician, but they are aware that, in reality, they will probably have to sacrifice these dreams for marriage, in keeping with the social mores of the period. Only Jo is driven enough to eschew matrimony in favour of a professional career as a novelist and she refuses to be dissuaded from her goal, even when her publisher, Mr. Dashwood (Tracy Letts), instructs her that if her main character is female then she “must be dead or married” at her story’s end. Such is the fate of women. The film charts the destiny of these people as they suffer ‘the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune’ over a number of years, documenting their lives as the girls grow into women.
Gerwig’s screenplay for Little Women is superb, beautifully portraying the semi-chaotic life of the household as the girls play, fight, argue and make-up, their words tumbling out as they jostle for space, talking over each other at rapid speed as if they only have so long to be heard. These scenes are well-designed and choreographed, too, and they often spill over from one room to another, all caught in long takes by the lens of French cinematographer Yorick Le Saux. The film looks splendid throughout but there is one scene in particular that is simply breathtaking, when Jo takes the ill Beth to the coast for a break. It could have been painted by one of the great Impressionists, the lighting and framing ably capturing both the beauty of the scene and the pathos of the situation. The ensemble cast is uniformly excellent so it’s hard to single out any one performer as all the actors have their particular talents, but one suspects that Ronan will be on the list of Oscar nominees next year. Having been nominated for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role twice before, perhaps it’ll be case of third time lucky for her effort here. She’s fabulous. The movie’s production values and costume design are exemplary as well, and Alexandre Desplat’s score magnificently augments the great classical music used on the soundtrack.
Little Women is, in Gerwig’s hands, a powerful statement about female empowerment that’s as relevant today as it was when it was first written. As Laura Dern put it, “It’s a story about identity and there’s nothing more modern than that. We still struggle today with how to ask, ‘who am I, and how, despite everyone else’s opinion, am I going to stand true to that in my life?’ - yet that’s what Louisa May Alcott wrote about 150 years ago. Part of the beauty of what Alcott did is that she established strength as independence, as art, as ambition but also as marriage and parenting, and Greta invites the audience to engage with all of that.”