Little Women (2019)

[chitowngirl]

My only complaint with this, and every other version, is that Beth never looks sick enough when she is dying. Frail, yes. The character was always that throughout. 
That being said, I would go and see it again in the theater. 

[Miss Slay]

I really enjoyed it. I thought I wouldn't because I grew up loving the '94 version and for me Winona is Jo. But this was wonderful and a really fresh look and approach to the story.

I did wonder, for those who have also watched the Anne of Green Gables movies back in the 80s. Were those influenced by Little Women? I haven't watched/read the book in years but I'll admit to know the AOGG films quite well and the scenes between Laurie/Jo and Gilbert/Anne were so similar - down to why she wouldn't marry and her excuse for not loving Gilbert/Laurie.

[lizzie3]

I saw the movie today with some family members.  Two of us are very familiar with the story (myself included), and the other two barely know the story.  We all concluded that it was an enjoyable movie and well-acted, however, the shifting timelines made it difficult to follow for those who weren't familiar with the story. 

I agree with everyone who said that this version made Amy much more likable, in fact, she turned out to be one of my favourites!  I never thought how she would feel the burden of marrying well and "saving the family" when the others weren't able to do so.  It was a fresh insight into the book and character.   

Overall, a most enjoyable evening at the movies.  The ending was cleverly done, and I appreciated how it kept to the books, but at the same time...didn't. 

[voiceover]

Haven't seen it yet, I confess -- though I will soon -- but a few things about the reviews & general buzz, been bugging the crap out of me.  So I'm here to unload, reserving the right to change my mind after I actually see it.

First: Greta Gerwig isn't the first director to have loved the source material, ffs.  Fairly easy to find interviews with Heidi Thomas and Gillian Armstrong where their reasons for signing onto the 2018/1994 versions were directly connected to longtime adoration of the book.

Then, there's Amy.  '33 and '49 versions skip right from Leaving for Europe/Sorry Jo! to Laurie reuniting with Amy after Beth's death.  And check out the threads of the BBC mini to read how I railed and fumed over how Amy's character unfairly drew the Villain card.

But one reason I loved the '94 version was Armstrong's choice to double cast the youngest sister.  Samantha Mathis nailed the resigned artistic heart, and **finally got a shot at the "Lazy Laurence" chapter, so long overlooked ("...I despise you," she soberly admits to a dissolute Teddy).  Finally you got to see the woman who turned Laurie's head, and set him to rights.  Anyone who's truly a book devotee, knows this side of Amy (along with the grace she shows towards her cousin Flo at that artists' fair -- her behavior there was the aunts' deciding factor in her being asked to go to Europe).  If your reax to the book was ever: "What a witch/she never deserved Laurie!", then you either skimmed/skipped those bits or  conveniently forgot them. 

And I was even a Jo/Laurie 'shipper.  Until I grew up.  But I never hated Amy.

Gerwig's tweaking with linear plot sounds intriguing, but hardly original to cinema.  My first thought when I read that she'd done that? "Wow, like Pulp Fiction -- but for chicks!"

And I can hardly bear Meryl showing up in yet another movie.  Even Judi-fucking-Dench gives Maggie Smith & co a shot at the Older Character Actress part.  Put Blythe Danner in the next one.

*blows out heavy sigh*

[voiceover]

43 minutes ago, lizzie3 said:

favourites!  I never thought how she would feel the burden of marrying well and "saving the family" when the others weren't able to do so.  

Again: this was a line from the book.  Amy defends her courtship with Fred Vaughan by telling Laurie that Meg didn't marry for money, and "Jo won't", so it was up to her to "marry well" and take care of her family.

After their return to the U.S., Laurie relents from his teasingly reminding her of that "mercenary wretch" moment -- by softly admitting "...you turned down a wealthier man [to marry me]..."

Alcott put it all right there.

Edited December 30, 2019 by voiceover

[Chaser]

Other thoughts..

The humor. I didn’t expect to laugh as much as I did. The part where Amy made a cast of her foot made me howl.

Regarding the infamous romantic pairings, Amy and Laurie were well done. They finally got the attention they deserved. I also felt like this adaptation better showed why Jo and Laurie wouldn’t work romantically. One disappointment for me though was Jo and The Professor. I wish there was a little more development there. 

[Ceindreadh]

2 hours ago, Chaser said:

Other thoughts..

The humor. I didn’t expect to laugh as much as I did. The part where Amy made a cast of her foot made me howl.

Regarding the infamous romantic pairings, Amy and Laurie were well done. They finally got the attention they deserved. I also felt like this adaptation better showed why Jo and Laurie wouldn’t work romantically. One disappointment for me though was Jo and The Professor. I wish there was a little more development there. 

I too was a bit disappointed with the lack of Jo and the Professor. I thought it a bit too convenient that he showed up once and everybody immediately pushed Jo to him. And then I realised that that was the whole point. Jo was going to leave her heroine single until her publisher insisted, so she quickly writes in a ‘happy ending’ no matter how unlikely it may be. 
 

[methodwriter85]

4 hours ago, voiceover said:

Samantha Mathis nailed the resigned artistic heart, and **finally got a shot at the "Lazy Laurence" chapter, so long overlooked ("...I despise you," she soberly admits to a dissolute Teddy).

21 minutes ago, Ceindreadh said:

I too was a bit disappointed with the lack of Jo and the Professor. I thought it a bit too convenient that he showed up once and everybody immediately pushed Jo to him. And then I realised that that was the whole point. Jo was going to leave her heroine single until her publisher insisted, so she quickly writes in a ‘happy ending’ no matter how unlikely it may be. 
 

Wow, your YMMV for this one, but I absolutely thought Samantha Mathis was the weak point of the 1994 version.  She just seemed so bland when Kirsten Dunst's Amy really popped. I loved how Florence Pugh struck a balance between showing a more mature Amy while not losing that spitfire in the 2019 version.

I was disappointed in the lack of Jo/Professor in this as well but then again, if I want the Jo and Professor storyline, all I have to do is watch the 1994 version because it was truly well-done. (And the 2018 Hallmark-esque version did it pretty well, to be honest.) I get what they're going for, and why we're sacrificing that story for broader development like Meg's marriage woes and the Amy/Laurie story. I did kind of wonder if that's why they cast such a sexy younger guy to play Bhaer in the 2019 version- Gerwig knew she wasn't going to spend much time on him, so she settled for strong eye candy because we weren't going to see how a young woman falls for a middle-aged, slightly stodgy man.

I liked this article about how Little Women's take on marriage isn't romantic, and how this current iteration really leans into it.

 

 

[MaggieG]

Saw this yesterday and really enjoyed it. I was never a huge fan of the book (I tried reading it as a child and just never got into it) and I've never seen any of the other versions. But I love Greta Gerwig and Saorse Ronan so I had to see this.

I really identified with Meg. Some of the issues her and John are going through are very similar to my own life right now. I also identified with Jo. Her conversation with Marmee at the end when she talked about Lauri and how maybe she would say yes if he asked her again and how she felt lonely really resonated with me. 

I laughed hysterically when the girls were talking about letting Lauri into the club and he jumped out of the rack of clothes to scare everyone.

I think all four actresses did a great job showing us the sisterly bond. Overall I thought this was a great movie. 

[Bastet]

Hmm.  I disliked Little Women when I read it, because Jo couldn't have the life she wanted, then as an adult learned about the sexist shenanigans where Alcott was forced to marry Jo off and thus came up with the deliberately weird pairings of Jo and the professor and Laurie and Amy, rather than going down the tired Jo/Laurie path some of her readers were inexplicably calling for.  That didn't save the book for me, but I appreciated it more knowing the context of what Alcott wanted to say and what she had to say.

I've only seen the Katharine Hepburn version among film adaptations (and only saw it because of Hepburn), but discussion of this one and comparisons to others (so much more widely available than when the 1994 version came out) has made me think I may want to see it  - and finally watch the 1994 film, which I just never got around to out of curiosity.  So I appreciate the links to various analyses as I just perused the thread.  This, in particular, from the Vox article, sounds most interesting:
 

Quote

 

“She said the whole book that she doesn’t want to marry anyone,” says Jo of her lead — if, at this point, we can truly call Saoirse Ronan’s character Jo: in this final sequence, she seems to exist in some free-floating liminal space between Jo and Alcott herself.

The publisher is unmoved. He tells her that no one will buy the book if the heroine remains unmarried.

Jo/Alcott shrugs. “I suppose marriage has always primarily been an economic proposition. Even in fiction,” she agrees, echoing Amy’s words to Laurie. We cut abruptly to Jo running to Professor Bhaer and professing her love to him, sheltered under an umbrella in the pouring rain. Then we cut back to the office, and Jo/Alcott, in a businesslike fashion, commences negotiating a higher rate of royalties out of her publisher.

“If I’m going to sell my heroine into marriage for money, I might as well get some of it,” she says.

What remains ambiguous is whether what we just saw “actually” happened within the world of the film — that is, whether Gerwig’s Jo truly married Bhaer — or if she just wrote a proposal scene into her book because she had to. But what is absolutely clear is that ending Little Women with a marriage is an economic choice.

Ronan’s Jo/Alcott hybrid is reenacting Alcott’s actual dilemma, the choice she made to rewrite Jo’s ending and sell her in marriage in order to sell her book. And Gerwig is explicitly linking Jo/Alcott’s decision to sell her heroine into a fictional marriage — that deeply unsatisfying marriage to Bhaer — to Amy’s decision to sell herself into marriage.

In both cases, Gerwig is saying, marriage is a business transaction. It’s the action of a woman who is living with profoundly curtailed choices, using her particular talents to make the decision that allows her to survive.

Gerwig doesn’t ask us to try to consider either of these marriages to be the stuff of fairy tale romance — even with a fully sympathetic Amy and a dissolute Laurie, even with a young and handsome and respectful Bhaer. Her primary concern is the same as Alcott’s was, under the layers of moralizing narration: it’s with their economic logic. And because Gerwig has stripped away from the text everything that might obscure that logic, for the first time, the ending to Little Women really feels fully satisfying.

 

I might finally like this thing.  When it's available to rent on Blu-Ray, I'll find out.

 

[Spartan Girl]

I actually like this better than the 1994 version. Having the flashbacks while framing it in the present did a better job of setting up Laurie and Amy as endgame. Laurie did come off as a douche sometimes, but he was better with Amy. 

Also liked that they kind of left it ambiguous whether Jo actually married the Professor or if that was actually her book ending that the editor forced on her. Professor was HOT though.

Great performances from Saoirse, Emma, Laura, and Meryl.

[Jillibean]

On 12/29/2019 at 11:54 PM, voiceover said:

Again: this was a line from the book.  Amy defends her courtship with Fred Vaughan by telling Laurie that Meg didn't marry for money, and "Jo won't", so it was up to her to "marry well" and take care of her family.

After their return to the U.S., Laurie relents from his teasingly reminding her of that "mercenary wretch" moment -- by softly admitting "...you turned down a wealthier man [to marry me]..."

Alcott put it all right there.

I don’t think anyone is saying she didn’t, or that Gerwig invented this portion of Amy. What is being said, and what I agree with, is that Gerwig is really the first director to highlight these sections of the text and use them to inform the depiction of Amy. None of the previous adaptations give much time or exploration to Amy’s motivations and thought process. Whether or not you like Samantha Mathis (I do, personally), she didn’t have anything like the material Pugh got for this one. She doesn’t get to talk about why she needs to marry rich or the box she has been forced into, or the idea that the only way she could truly have power was to embrace and own the decision. The 1994 version doesn’t include Aunt March directly telling Amy that her entire family is dependent on her marrying well.  I always loved the Europe scenes between Amy and Laurie in the 1994 version, especially him touching her nose, but despite her scolding him and him harrumphing off to grow up, he still comes off to me as the one with the power in the relationship. Samantha Mathis plays adult Amy as sort of coy and gentle, and Pugh’s approach is different. This version also, IMO, highlights more the ways Jo plays into and instigates the Amy/Jo sometimes fraught dynamic, which helps Amy come across as less of a brat. And the fact that ultimately Amy marries Laurie even though he’s less rich than Fred is acknowledged in this version as well.  

I love the 1994 movie. I think it’s incredibly well done and in many ways is a more faithful adaptation of the book than this version since it is chronological and more thorough. But I think both movies can exist and actually supplement each other in certain ways, because this movie also brings pieces that the 1994 movie lacks. It’s not a criticism of the 1994 movie, just an inevitability of two incredibly capable directors with amazing casts each adapting a book they love. There are strengths to each, things each does better and things each does not as well as the other. If you love the 1994 version, still give this one a chance. I also love the 1994 version, and seeing and loving this one made me want to watch both again.

[ellenr33]

The only thing that bugged me is that none of these characters age at all during the movie. It bugged me the whole movie especially with Amy's character. 

[AimingforYoko]

8 hours ago, ellenr33 said:

The only thing that bugged me is that none of these characters age at all during the movie. It bugged me the whole movie especially with Amy's character. 

They tried their best, with dress and hairstyles, but is there anyway we were supposed to believe Beth was older than Amy?

And is Jo/Laurie the earliest literary example of the "Friend Zone"?

[Brn2bwild]

What surprised me about this was how much I liked Beth.  Based on reviews, I wasn't expecting her to make much of an impression at all.  But unlike other movie versions, this Beth could be playful and sometimes resentful.  I loved how during their trip to the sea, she said to Jo: "I'm very sick, so you have to write."  

I liked Claire Danes's Beth from 1994, but she always seemed so stiff, awkward, and serious.  The 1949 Beth faded into the woodwork, and I can't remember anything about the other Beths I've seen.  The 2019 Beth seems like she's part of the sisters unit, not just someone expected to die later in the story.

On the other hand, I felt like this Laurie was the weak link of the movie.  Even though he is one year older than Florence Pugh and one year younger than Saorise Ronan, he always seemed like a teenager next to them, and never came across as a desirable match.  That he is still one of the stronger Lauries (Christian Bale being the best) says a lot about how bad the Laurie character has been over the decades.  Peter Lawford's colorless Laurie from the 1949 movie comes to mind.

[SomeTameGazelle]

23 hours ago, AimingforYoko said:

They tried their best, with dress and hairstyles, but is there anyway we were supposed to believe Beth was older than Amy?

I was frustrated by the fact that Meg and Jo didn't consistently put their hair up to signify adulthood, especially at Meg's wedding. And I was disappointed that Meg's arc didn't include the scene where Aunt March's interference drives her to declare that she will marry John Brooke.

I enjoyed the movie but I don't know how easy it is to follow the story if you aren't already familiar. And although I understood the point of the ending, I was frustrated by the handling of Professor Bhaer and Jo's apparent regret over rejecting Laurie. If she was not really going to fall in love with Fritz, why not make him less of a pinup? Why have him totally inappropriately drop in on the family when they have not been corresponding at all? If Jo (as distinct from Alcott) really prefers not to marry, why did she write that letter to Laurie? I was hoping that they would show that in reality Jo hired Professor Bhaer to teach at her school.

The accents bothered me a little bit. I spent the whole time thinking Bhaer sounded more French than German. And old Mr Laurence having a southern accent seemed out of place. I mostly didn't find fault with the accents of the girls -- it would have been better if they had been more regionally-specific, but the only time I really reacted was when their put-on Pickwick Club British accents were too good.

Edited January 2, 2020 by SomeTameGazelle
Laurence, not Lawrence.

[JAYJAY1979]

I prefer the 1949 version myself.. because it was more subtle and not at all distracting the feminist message.  

[SomeTameGazelle]

On 12/29/2019 at 7:16 PM, Miss Slay said:

I did wonder, for those who have also watched the Anne of Green Gables movies back in the 80s. Were those influenced by Little Women? I haven't watched/read the book in years but I'll admit to know the AOGG films quite well and the scenes between Laurie/Jo and Gilbert/Anne were so similar - down to why she wouldn't marry and her excuse for not loving Gilbert/Laurie.

I can't believe there is any way that Kevin Sullivan didn't crib the Anne scenes from the 1949 Little Women -- both the proposal and a scene where Laurie intercepts Jo on her way to or from the post office. They're so much like Little Women and not anywhere in the text of Anne of Green Gables. I get angry every time I think of it.

[SomeTameGazelle]

On 8/14/2019 at 1:19 PM, katha said:

IMO the character in the book comes across as really of her time and all the pronouncements she makes to the girls about how they should behave are adhering to very, very restrictive gender norms

The only discussions I remember are the ones where Marmee tells Meg to let John share in the childcare and where she assures Jo and Meg "better be happy old maids than unhappy wives, or unmaidenly girls, running about to find husbands". The words are gendered but the idea that she wants her daughters to be happy more than she wants them to marry is not. And the suggestion that both men and women should be responsible for childcare is obviously egalitarian.

[ruby24]

So I saw this today and I really don't think it holds a candle to the 1994 one. That one was better all around.

The disjointed flashback stuff didn't work at all. My grandma had no idea when anything was happening because the thing is, no one looked any older or younger in any scene! And there were no time stamps. The only indicator was sometimes Jo's hair length.

Florence Pugh CANNOT play a 12-year-old. That was absurd. I'm sorry, but you have to cast Amy as two different people. You just have to. She has to be a child actress to do the bratty shit she does in the childhood scenes. Pugh looked older than all the sisters AND Timothy Chalamet. Braids and bangs did not make her appear younger, nor did her acting.

What a mistake that was. I didn't believe her as a child in any of her scenes. None of them.

I also didn't like the meta joke they made about the entire ending. This was the worst casting of Bhaer ever, and if Gerwig doesn't like the ending, why not change it altogether and just have Jo stay single? This movie focuses the least on Jo/Laurie of any version I've ever seen, and yet this is the one that has her change her mind about him at the end? So that it really does appear she's settling for Bhaer (if that even happened at all)?

Saoirse Ronan was a very good Jo, and Meryl Streep was great as Aunt March. That's all I've got for positives. I really didn't like Chalamet as Laurie- I didn't believe he loved Jo OR Amy.

[kiddo82]

I like the idea of the flashbacks better than they were executed.  However, the thing I do appreciate about it is that while both the book and the '94 version kind of fall off a cliff in the second half, I think at least Gerwig mitigates that by going back and forth.  

[ruby24]

I don't think the 94 one falls off a cliff- I just think that's the part of the book people like less. No one wants to see Laurie and Amy to get together, and no one wants to see Jo and Bhaer to get together, but that's what happens, so it has to happen. 

But as much as no one wants to see it, I thought the 90's one did it as well as possible. I actually really like the line Laurie has where he says to Amy, "just as you have always known you would never marry a pauper, I have always known that I should be part of the March family," which is such a key component to his character, that I think it should be kept in every version.

And again, this movie focuses so little on Jo and Laurie's friendship, that you don't even get why he's so miserable about being rejected by her. Their friendship is a very key part of the novel, and it's a mistake to cut that out. I don't know if they were trying to force you to think he really does belong with Amy by leaving out how close he and Jo were or something, but that cuts all the truly crushing heartbreak out of the story. You have to really want them to get together, like millions of people always have, and why they've never been satisfied by how it ends (and why other versions often ignore Amy/Laurie altogether and minimize the Bhaer stuff as much as possible). 

The Jo/Laurie unrequited romance is one of the biggest reasons for the lasting popularity of the book. You have to keep it in there.

Edited January 2, 2020 by ruby24

[Anela]

8 hours ago, ruby24 said:

I don't think the 94 one falls off a cliff- I just think that's the part of the book people like less. No one wants to see Laurie and Amy to get together, and no one wants to see Jo and Bhaer to get together, but that's what happens, so it has to happen. 

But as much as no one wants to see it, I thought the 90's one did it as well as possible. I actually really like the line Laurie has where he says to Amy, "just as you have always known you would never marry a pauper, I have always known that I should be part of the March family," which is such a key component to his character, that I think it should be kept in every version.

And again, this movie focuses so little on Jo and Laurie's friendship, that you don't even get why he's so miserable about being rejected by her. Their friendship is a very key part of the novel, and it's a mistake to cut that out. I don't know if they were trying to force you to think he really does belong with Amy by leaving out how close he and Jo were or something, but that cuts all the truly crushing heartbreak out of the story. You have to really want them to get together, like millions of people always have, and why they've never been satisfied by how it ends (and why other versions often ignore Amy/Laurie altogether and minimize the Bhaer stuff as much as possible). 

The Jo/Laurie unrequited romance is one of the biggest reasons for the lasting popularity of the book. You have to keep it in there.

I was thinking the same thing. I liked this movie, and am glad that we watched it the other night, but I kept thinking about Laurie not just crushing on Jo, but loving the entire family. He was lonely, and they basically brought him right in as one of their own. 

[SeanC]

On 1/2/2020 at 1:58 AM, ruby24 said:

The disjointed flashback stuff didn't work at all. My grandma had no idea when anything was happening because the thing is, no one looked any older or younger in any scene! And there were no time stamps. The only indicator was sometimes Jo's hair length.

The differing timelines have wildly different colour grading (everything in the "present" is in muted, blue tones).

Quote

This movie focuses the least on Jo/Laurie of any version I've ever seen, and yet this is the one that has her change her mind about him at the end? So that it really does appear she's settling for Bhaer (if that even happened at all)?

She didn't change her mind about him, she briefly surrendered to fear of being alone and then had that thwarted.

21 hours ago, ruby24 said:

And again, this movie focuses so little on Jo and Laurie's friendship, that you don't even get why he's so miserable about being rejected by her. Their friendship is a very key part of the novel, and it's a mistake to cut that out. I don't know if they were trying to force you to think he really does belong with Amy by leaving out how close he and Jo were or something, but that cuts all the truly crushing heartbreak out of the story. You have to really want them to get together, like millions of people always have, and why they've never been satisfied by how it ends (and why other versions often ignore Amy/Laurie altogether and minimize the Bhaer stuff as much as possible). 

The Jo/Laurie unrequited romance is one of the biggest reasons for the lasting popularity of the book. You have to keep it in there.

It was in there.  I don't see how Jo and Laurie's friendship is absent at all.  We see quite a lot of them interacting.  But Jo's arc is not all about Laurie (and vice versa, since the latter's arc is about moving past her); Gerwig's screenplay is one of the best for Laurie, I would say, as it does a much better job of selling his ending with Amy  (in part by also giving us the best cinematic Amy).

[Eunike]

I may be in the minority, but I never cared for Jo and Laurie as a romantic couple.  It always seemed one-sided in the book to me, and I hated that Laurie wouldn't listen to Jo and tried to wear her down with his proposal despite Jo making it very clear she didn't love Laurie in that way.  

I thought this film portrayed their relationship closest to the book.  Gerwig frames their relationship as platonic, although Laurie has mistaken it for romantic. I found the scene tragic, not for romantic reasons, but because their friendship will never be the same.  Due to the film's non-linear structure, we already know Jo and Laurie still don't talk to each other years later.   

This was the first film that I thought got Amy and Amy and Laurie right.  Other films focus mostly on Jo, which is why Amy usually comes across as nothing more than the bratty younger sister who gets everything handed to her. Amy gets a ton of character development here, and for the first time on screen, we see her motivations. Amy and Laurie are also shown together quite a bit, and their relationship develops organically.  I like how Gerwig contrasts  Lauries's proposal to Jo with the lazy Laurence scene in France by showing why Amy and Laurie work well together as a couple and why Jo and Laurie don't.

Overall, I enjoyed the film quite a bit, and I had no problems with distinguishing the two timelines.  As a fan of all the sisters, and not just Jo,  it was nice to see them get more character development, especially Amy.  I grew up with the 1994 film and still love it, but I think I prefer this one.     

[angora]

Count me among those who loved it. I can't get into the 1994 vs. 2019 stuff, both because each film has areas where I think it really excels and because the '94 film has been one of my favorite movies since I was a kid and it's not fair to ask another adaptation to try and crack that nostalgia.

I agree with everyone who said this version definitely succeeds when it comes to Amy and Amy/Laurie. The flashback structure helps in that sense, since we regularly go back and forth between the brattier younger Amy and the more grown-up/clear-eyed older Amy, and we actually see Laurie in a scene with Amy BEFORE we ever see him with Jo (the same could be said for Professor Bhaer and Jo, although he's certainly more of an afterthought in the film.) The Amy/Laurie scenes in France are given space to breathe, room for their love story to develop.

I agree with @Eunike that the movie doesn't really diminish Jo and Laurie's relationship. I got in every flashback that Laurie was totally hung up on Jo, a fact that Jo didn't notice and/or willfully ignored to varying degrees throughout the story. That said, I agree with others who found the proposal scene lacking. That's one that is SO iconic in the '94 version,  and I admittedly probably wouldn't have been satisfied with anything this one tried to do there.

The flashback structure mostly worked for me. I think it helped keep up momentum throughout and brought out some interesting ideas through the past/present scenes they chose to pair (even if, at times, it felt like a reach to get to a particular flashback.) It wasn't difficult for me to keep track, although I wondered now and then how someone who wasn't familiar with the story would fare. In addition to the color palette/tone that others have mentioned, I always noticed other touchstones like Amy's hair (usually in plaits when she's younger) and Jo's clothes (generically feminine but messy when she's younger, a little more masculine when she's older.)

All the Beth stuff got to me like crazy, especially everything involving Beth and Mr. Laurence (oh my god, I love that they included the scene of Jo offering Mr. Laurence her friendship when he felt so lost after Beth's death.) I lost count of how many times I cried. I really liked the juxtaposition of Jo waking up in Beth's room, first when she recovered from scarlet fever and then when she finally passed away. Marmee sobbing in Jo's arms was heartbreaking.

One little thing I really loved was how chaotic the big group scenes between the sisters were. All that laughing and bickering and talking over one another - it was this beautiful, cozy madness, and as soon as Laurie walked into Orchard House that first night, you could see it written all over his face that he was in love with it and wanted to feel a part of it.

I also loved the conversation that Jo and Amy (and I think Meg? I know she was there, but the back-and-forth was mainly between Jo and Amy) about her book and whether a story about the domestic life of young women was "important," with Jo arguing that it wasn't substantial enough to write about and Amy countering that writing about it would MAKE it substantial. It's a great theme to ponder all on its own, but it's also directly applicable to this film and awards season. I know that, in recent years, I've caught myself looking at certain Best Picture-nominated films (interestingly enough, Brooklyn and Lady Bird) and thinking, "Sure, it's an amazing movie and I loved it, but it's not a really a 'Best Picture' type of story, is it?" I've had to interrogate why my kneejerk reaction is to look at these films and see something less weighty/worthy, even when they've been better made than some of their fellow nominees that had more typical "Best Picture" subject matter. We've already seen that kind of thing happening with this movie, with the news that not many male awards voters attended early sceenings.

All in all, I thought it was pretty wonderful, and despite my natural inclination to want to rank things, I'm okay with loving both it and the '94 version for different reasons. Two versions to watch on alternating Christmases? Works for me!

[SomeTameGazelle]

12 hours ago, angora said:

That said, I agree with others who found the proposal scene lacking. That's one that is SO iconic in the '94 version,  and I admittedly probably wouldn't have been satisfied with anything this one tried to do there.

I actually think I liked this version of Laurie's proposal to Jo the best of any adaptation I have seen. I like Christian Bale as an actor but he was never Laurie to me, and Winona Ryder was much too petite. Timothée Chalamet had the right look for me and Saoirse Ronan really convinced me that she knew it was a bad idea. In this version of the story, did Laurie know about Professor Bhaer when he proposed? I remember him complaining that Jo would fall in love with some generic other man, but not specifically the professor as he does in the book.

[Linderhill]

22 hours ago, angora said:

how chaotic the big group scenes between the sisters were.

I really hated that about the movie.  I remarked to the friend that I went to the movie with that my sisters and I have never been like that.  

I grew up with 2 older sisters and was constantly told by teachers and other well meaning adults that I needed to read Little Women.  I was told it so much that I absolutely refused to have anything to do with the book or the movie.  The only reason we even went to this movie was because there was literally nothing else we wanted to see.  I think I saw a couple glimpses of the Katherine Hepburn version and a couple from the Winona Ryder versions simply because they were on at a point i couldn't avoid.   I did know some of the basic plot points (like Beth dying -- thanks Friends and that long ago scene in the Hepburn version) and that the boy that Jo had been seeing would marry one of the other sisters.  

I found the time jumps confusing since I was unfamiliar with the story.  I got annoyed with the hair styles (I didn't think that Jo's hair was long enough to sell and hated that frousy style she wore).  

Overall I did enjoy the movie to a certain extent just felt general frustration with some of it.   

[scarynikki12]

23 hours ago, angora said:

One little thing I really loved was how chaotic the big group scenes between the sisters were.

It was so great. It reminds me of what it was like when mine and my brother's best friends would get together. His two BFF are the younger siblings of my BFF so the five of us were around each other a lot growing up. A couple years ago we had a game night that included their older brother. At one point the five of us slipped back into the chaotic discussions we'd cultivated in childhood and older bro just watched us in amazement. He had no idea what any of us were saying as we were all shouting but he was impressed that we all heard each other and that we were able to follow the three different conversations taking place simultaneously without any issue. We pointed out that it was his own fault for not playing with us when we were kids. So the chaos of the March sisters brought on a ton of nostalgia for me and it's clear that Gerwig understands that kind of chaos well.

[phalange]

Having never seen the other movies, I had nothing to compare this one to, and I really loved it. The non-linear story really worked for me, and I found it pretty easy to follow, as did the people I saw it with who weren't familiar with the original story. The scene of Jo coming down the stairs to find Beth sitting at the table juxtaposed with the scene of her coming down to find that Beth had died got me choked up, even though of course I knew it was coming, and the scene of Jo telling Beth a story on the beach was both beautiful and sad. 

I think was a good choice to expand the other sister's stories, because it made the Amy/Laurie pairing make more sense. I have no horse in this particular race, but I feel like the scenes in Paris made you realize why Amy and Laurie were more suited for each other than Laurie and Jo. And it made me feel for Amy, to see the pressure put on her by Aunt March to basically be the savior of her family (in Aunt March's eyes).

I also really liked the end, with Jo speaking to the audience both as herself and as a surrogate for Alcott, and how it was ambiguous whether Jo really went after the Professor or if that was just her being forced to write the ending the publisher wanted. The Professor was there in the scene at Jo's school at the very end so I feel like she did go after him, but I appreciate that it could go either way. And the very final scene of Jo watching her book finally being printed was perfect. 

[Growsonwalls]

I have a question. As someone who adored the 1994 film I thought one of the best things it did was have Winona Ryder really be heartbroken over Laurie's marriage. Like you feel she loves him but not THAT WAY but she's nonetheless sad that he marries Amy. It really captured the bittersweet quality to the Jo/Laurie relationship.

Does this film have that? I'm really wondering whether I want to see it.

[ClareWalks]

10 hours ago, Growsonwalls said:

I have a question. As someone who adored the 1994 film I thought one of the best things it did was have Winona Ryder really be heartbroken over Laurie's marriage. Like you feel she loves him but not THAT WAY but she's nonetheless sad that he marries Amy. It really captured the bittersweet quality to the Jo/Laurie relationship.

Does this film have that? I'm really wondering whether I want to see it.

I think Jo actually is SADDER in this version than in the 94 version. She is clearly distraught for a bit, whereas Winona Ryder played it a bit more "surprised, but recovers quickly."

[voiceover]

On 1/3/2020 at 12:36 PM, Eunike said:

I found the scene tragic, not for romantic reasons, but because their friendship will never be the same.  Due to the film's non-linear structure, we already know Jo and Laurie still don't talk to each other years later.   

I'm confused by this (still haven't seen this version).  Does that mean according to Gerwig's interpretation, "Jo and Laurie still don't talk to each other years later"?    

Edited January 6, 2020 by voiceover
Never try to edit your own post on your iPhone

[Eunike]

5 hours ago, voiceover said:

I'm confused by this (still haven't seen this version).  Does that mean according to Gerwig's interpretation, "Jo and Laurie still don't talk to each other years later"?    

The movie begins with the characters as adults flashing back to their past.  The structure of the film is non-linear, jumping back and forth between the two timelines, so by the time we get to Jo and Laurie's proposal in the movie, we've already known for a long time that the two don't keep in contact in the future.  There's about a four-year time jump between Laurie's proposal to Jo and his return from Europe with Amy.  

[voiceover]

4 hours ago, Eunike said:

The movie begins with the characters as adults flashing back to their past.  The structure of the film is non-linear, jumping back and forth between the two timelines, so by the time we get to Jo and Laurie's proposal in the movie, we've already known for a long time that the two don't keep in contact in the future.  There's about a four-year time jump between Laurie's proposal to Jo and his return from Europe with Amy.  

I was aware of the structural tinkering, and the time gap, but this whole "don't keep in contact in the future" is an invention of Gerwig's.  

In Alcott's version, there's a bittersweet moment at the end of their initial reunion (upon Laurie & Amy's return as husband and wife).  He tells Jo that they can go back to the way things used to be; she gently points out that that can never happen.  They're not playmates anymore; they're man and woman, but will always be close ("...and from the grave of a boyish passion had arisen a friendship that would bless them both...").

In the last chapter of the first novel, we find out that Jo's even named her youngest son "Teddy" (h/t to Alcott's toy prescience!!).  And she's fond of pointing Laurie out to her students, calling him her "first success".

I should reserve judgement but I already hate that big of a change from the book.  

[SomeTameGazelle]

1 hour ago, voiceover said:

I was aware of the structural tinkering, and the time gap, but this whole "don't keep in contact in the future" is an invention of Gerwig's.  

In Alcott's version, there's a bittersweet moment at the end of their initial reunion (upon Laurie & Amy's return as husband and wife).  He tells Jo that they can go back to the way things used to be; she gently points out that that can never happen.  They're not playmates anymore; they're man and woman, but will always be close ("...and from the grave of a boyish passion had arisen a friendship that would bless them both...").

In the last chapter of the first novel, we find out that Jo's even named her youngest son "Teddy" (h/t to Alcott's toy prescience!!).  And she's fond of pointing Laurie out to her students, calling him her "first success".

I should reserve judgement but I already hate that big of a change from the book.  

The movie doesn't have them never speak again. But Jo and Laurie don't correspond while he is in Europe so Jo has no idea that he and Amy are together until they come home married. (Also in the movie no one tells Amy how ill Beth is because they don't want her to cut short her trip; in the book I think she doesn't receive the first letter and by the time she gets the second letter it was too late.)

My least favourite change from the book was the part where Gerwig has Jo write to Laurie before she knows he is engaged to Amy essentially begging him to take her back. She puts the letter into the little mailbox they had for passing things back and forth, and then has to rush to retrieve it before he sees it after he and Amy show up already married. I know a lot of people wish Jo and Laurie had got together, but Alcott goes to extreme lengths to show and tell why that is not what Jo wants (immediately after Laurie proposes to her she is wishing that he could love Beth instead), and it undermines the thesis that it's ok for Jo not to want to marry.

[SeanC]

17 minutes ago, SomeTameGazelle said:

My least favourite change from the book was the part where Gerwig has Jo write to Laurie before she knows he is engaged to Amy essentially begging him to take her back. She puts the letter into the little mailbox they had for passing things back and forth, and then has to rush to retrieve it before he sees it after he and Amy show up already married. I know a lot of people wish Jo and Laurie had got together, but Alcott goes to extreme lengths to show and tell why that is not what Jo wants (immediately after Laurie proposes to her she is wishing that he could love Beth instead), and it undermines the thesis that it's ok for Jo not to want to marry.

The scene with Jo and Marmee is fairly explicit that Jo's willingness to reconsider isn't founded on good reasoning.

[voiceover]

5 hours ago, SomeTameGazelle said:

The movie doesn't have them never speak again. But Jo and Laurie don't correspond while he is in Europe so Jo has no idea that he and Amy are together until they come home married

Okay.  Obviously I need to see it for myself, since it appears that you and @Eunike are reading it two different ways.  E responded to my question by writing that the two "don't keep in contact in the future", then your post says "The movie doesn't have them never speak again."

So until I can judge for myself, I'll assume the truth of the screenplay is somewhere in the middle.  

Or.  Did you both mean the "no contact" only covered his time in Europe???  Then I missed that entirely -- though that's what did happen in the book too.

<jumps online to buy fucking ticket already>

 

p.s.  Excellent Women and A Glass of Blessings are my favorites!!!  My ex used to call your fave "Suntanned Gazelle"🤣

Edited January 7, 2020 by voiceover

[Eunike]

1 hour ago, voiceover said:

Okay.  Obviously I need to see it for myself, since it appears that you and @Eunike are reading it two different ways.  E responded to my question by writing that the two "don't keep in contact in the future", then your post says "The movie doesn't have them never speak again."

So until I can judge for myself, I'll assume the truth of the screenplay is somewhere in the middle.  

Or.  Did you both mean the "no contact" only covered his time in Europe???  Then I missed that entirely -- though that's what did happen in the book too.

<jumps online to buy fucking ticket already>

 

p.s.  Excellent Women and A Glass of Blessings are my favorites!!!  My ex used to call your fave "Suntanned Gazelle"🤣

I meant the no contact only covered Europe.  Jo and Laurie do talk to each other again once he returns at the end.   I just thought that the non-linear timeline added to the sadness between the two.  Laurie's first scene takes place in Europe and we know immediately that he and Jo are no longer on good terms.  According to Greta's script, John and Meg's wedding takes place in 1865 while the present-day is in 1869, so that's about four years of no contact.  

[SomeTameGazelle]

2 hours ago, voiceover said:

Or.  Did you both mean the "no contact" only covered his time in Europe???  Then I missed that entirely -- though that's what did happen in the book too.

Yes, no contact only until Laurie and Amy return from Europe together. Sorry that I confused you.

In the book they actually do have contact while Laurie is away. There is a whole section where Laurie is trying to nourish his broken heart by composing music, and essentially finds that his attempts to dramatize Jo are too comedic, so he somehow finds it much easier to work with a blonde heroine. Somewhere in there before Beth dies he writes to Jo and asks her to reconsider, and she refuses again. 

8 hours ago, SeanC said:

The scene with Jo and Marmee is fairly explicit that Jo's willingness to reconsider isn't founded on good reasoning.

Jo can make irrational decisions, but I hope that Gerwig would have a reason to choose to have her do so. Why change open and transparent communication between Jo and Laurie to weak emotional error from Jo that she has to hide? Why change the scene where Laurie sees Jo for the first time after his marriage from one where she is pleased that he is with Amy and they are able to be comfortable with each other for the first time since he proposed to Jo and upset the sibling relationship she wanted to one where she seems unhappy that she can't have him? Those choices should mean something. It seemed to me they were intended to detract from the idea that Jo could really be happy single or that she might prefer Professor Bhaer.

Edited January 7, 2020 by SomeTameGazelle

[ElectricBoogaloo]

BAFTA nominations:

Adapted Screenplay - Greta Gerwig
Leading Actress - Saoirse Ronan
Supporting Actress - Florence Pugh
Costume Design - Jacqueline Durran

[Browncoat]

I finally got to see this last night, and I enjoyed it.  I have only a passing familiarity with the story (mostly from cultural osmosis, as I’ve never read the book), but the jumping timeline didn’t bother or confuse me.  I agree, though, that Amy looked too old in the earliest times, and I could hear a bit of an Irish accent from time to time from our Jo.  

I did like the more ambiguous ending.

[Growsonwalls]

I just saw this. There are things I loved about this version and also things I really disliked. Here is what I liked:

- I loved the flashback structure. I thought that it solved one of the biggest problems of the Little Women -- the warm, charming, but slow-moving first "childhood" half with the somewhat depressing, adult second half. By tying the two together constantly in flashback we see how childhood dreams dissolve into harsh realities.

- I loved Saoirse Ronan as Jo. I love Winona Ryder but she wasn't strong enough as Jo. Ronan does have the fierceness and tomboyish-ness.

- I LOVED Jo's bittersweet reaction to Laurie marrying Amy. Love is not always romantic and it's possible to be absolutely heartbroken that a childhood friend has now moved on. 

- The development of the Amy/Laurie romance. Thought it was well-done and believable. 

- I liked how Beth was portrayed as genuinely sickly from the beginning. It made her early demise believable.

- I loved the really physical fight between Jo and Amy. There was nothing ladylike about it. In general I enjoyed the rough-and-tumble of this Little Women compared to the previous versions.

Now with that being said, there's some things that didn't work for me:

-  Florence Pugh as 12 year old Amy: NO. She was a great adult/Europe Amy but as a 12 year old? No. Her voice is the deepest and huskiest of the sisters. 

- The very modern vocal inflections during the movie were jarring. 

- The scene with Meg at the ball cut one of my favorite scenes from the book: when Meg overhears the other girls making fun of her dress and socioeconomic status. 

- Professor Bhaer. I know Gerwig wanted it to deliberately be ambiguous if the ending was fiction or reality. But in this version the seem like they barely know each other and there's nothing to suggest Jo really likes him.

- Meryl Streep as Aunt March. Yes yes I know Meryl is a goddess but sometimes I feel like her acting is now a collection of tics and mannerisms and this is exhibit A.

But overall I enjoyed this version. I think it's a great supplement to the 1994 version. Both have their virtues and flaws. 

[Simon Boccanegra]

I've never read the novel, and my only prior experience with the story was one viewing of the 1994 film, which I liked very much. I remember my mother watching the allegedly horrible television miniseries.  

I'll admit, for the first 10 or 15 minutes, the Gerwig approach was a little disorienting ("Europe! Concord! Older! Younger!"). It does assume familiarity. But then I caught on to it, with the color grading and other context clues. It was a quick adjustment, and I've loved other movies that shuffle the past and present rather than being in strict chronological order (Manchester by the Sea, for example). I thought Gerwig was inventive in the way she contrasted scenes, and the Adapted Screenplay nomination this morning was astute.  

I ended up liking this film as much as the 1994 one, just for different reasons. I think 2019 is a more intense and pointed version. The 1994 -- again, going on the long-ago memory of one viewing -- was more of a "classical" adaptation, and it was mellower in tone. The actors were more obviously making an effort to convince that they were 19th-century people via their bearing and speech. Gerwig seems to have liberated her cast from that, and her film plays like a non-updated update. I think its more directly about the experience of a writer, specifically a female writer.  

Edited January 14, 2020 by Simon Boccanegra

[Jillibean]

On 1/12/2020 at 3:11 PM, Growsonwalls said:

- Professor Bhaer. I know Gerwig wanted it to deliberately be ambiguous if the ending was fiction or reality. But in this version the seem like they barely know each other and there's nothing to suggest Jo really likes him.

After another rewatch of the 1994 version, I’ve decided that professor Bhaer was the weakest point for me in the new version. Professor Bhaer doesn’t have to be “eye candy.” He DOES have to be intelligent and critical of Jo’s writing while still being kind, genuine and generous. He DOES have to seem like he loves Jo’s mind, rather than just being physically attracted to her. This version really didn’t do it for me and I had no investment in whether or not Jo married him—which, as I write that sentence, I come to realize was possibly the point.

Happy to see Florence Pugh with a well deserved nomination (Saoirse was always a given). VERY disappointed not to see a nod for Gerwig. I think that was a real miss by the academy. 

[ElectricBoogaloo]

Critics' Choice Award!

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY - Greta Gerwig

[Sarah 103]

I am thrilled with all of the Oscar nominations but Greta Gerwig not nominated for directing is a major snub. This movie also should have been nominated for best picture. 

At first I wasn't sure about the flashbacks, and then realized it was brilliant. It allows the viewer to make clear contrasts between the past and present and clearly demonstrates how the past informs the present. Also, the fact that the flashbacks had a yellowish nostalgic tint to them made it clear to me when we were in the past and when it was present day for the characters.

 I loved the way they showed a clear contrast to how still and quiet the Lawerence home was with how noisy and active the March household was. 

Edited January 16, 2020 by Sarah 103

[shoregirl]

13 hours ago, Sarah 103 said:

I am thrilled with all of the Oscar nominations but Greta Gerwig not nominated for directing is a major snub. This movie also should have been nominated for best picture. 

 

Little Women is nominated for Best Picture.

[Spartan Girl]

1 hour ago, shoregirl said:

Little Women is nominated for Best Picture.

But not Best Director, which is so infuriating.  Screw Todd Phillips, Greta should have had his spot.

[shoregirl]

27 minutes ago, Spartan Girl said:

But not Best Director, which is so infuriating.  Screw Todd Phillips, Greta should have had his spot.

I agree but I was responding to the poster saying it should have been nominated for best picture. That lack of women being nominated year after year for best director is infuriating.

 

Edited January 16, 2020 by shoregirl