Please note: Since this film has been in release for some weeks, I feel comfortable discussing all aspects of it – beginning, middle, and end. In other words, you might want to avoid reading this if you don’t want the movie spoiled for you. Also, I normally provide hyperlinks for any book or film production or television show mentioned in a post. As you’ll see, there are too many to link. I’m sorry, but you’ll just have to look them up with IMDB or Wikipedia.
This is not a review. If it were, I would exhaustively examine every aspect of this film which I think is exceptionally well made in all technical aspects. And I totally understand a filmmaker’s desire to leave their individual stamp on the remake of a film, especially one with so many versions. BUT… one should know that when touching a property woven deeply into the cultural fabric, one should tread lightly and carefully. Greta Gerwig in her desire to make this property hers and infuse it with a modern feminism did not tread lightly.
Please know that I’m not criticizing the feminist rants sprinkled throughout. Those are fine. Little Women has always been subversively feminist. At some point in growing up, what girl doesn’t identify with smart, awkward, blunt Jo? The strictures placed on anyone without their own money and enough of it to live comfortably, albeit modestly, are maddeningly difficult. The book describes, harshly in some cases, almost every career available to a respectable woman in the mid-nineteenth century. Little Women, simply by illustrating the plain lives of the March sisters and their humble ambitions, is a treatise on the condition of early 19th century women and we feel deeply the societal restraints placed on them.
The characterizations and the casting of the protagonist daughters are spot on. These actresses imbue the roles with humanity and embody each sister with her unique character. They have already made their mark in films. Emma Watson, the erstwhile Hermione Granger from the Harry Potter films, plays Meg. Saiorse Ronan, most recently seen in Gerwig’s Lady Bird, and as Mary, Queen of Scots with Margot Robey’s Elizabeth I, plays Jo. Midsommar‘s Florence Pugh is stunning as Amy; and Eliza Scanlen, recently seen in HBO’s Sharp Objects and the least well-known, is Beth.
The production values are exquisite. A scene at the seashore is reminiscent of impressionist paintings. I can find no fault with the costume or art direction, both are meticulous in their detail. It is lovely in every respect.
My irritation is founded in Gerwig’s rearranging of the story. She begins at the two-thirds mark in the book with Jo located in New York. Steadily, she literally flips back and forth in the pivotal scenes to tell the story of the March sisters. Any viewer who has never read the book will be totally lost. Really lost. When I realized how the story was being revealed I gave up on my spouse ever achieving understanding of its importance. And after all, as a man who grew up from boyhood, when would he have ever met Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy? (Please don’t send me notes describing how your husband / boyfriend / brother et al. has read and enjoyed the book. It’s the original “chick lit.” If he did, which March sister did he identify with? Don’t say Mr. Brook, Laurie, Mr. Laurence, Professor Bhaer, or Mr. March. This isn’t their story. They’re supporting personnel only.)
As tiresome as it may be to observe this, sometimes the way a story is told is important. It’s important to see the sisters grow up together, endure their trials together, learn to become decent adult citizens together, share their joys together. There are lessons here and they bear repeating over and over because they reflect the human condition in full. To alternate between tween years and young adulthood, and flip back and forth in the tale, diminishes the understanding of the journey to maturity of the sisters.
Additionally, this leads to puzzling moments: Aunt March sighs over Meg’s marriage to penniless Mr. Brook, and lectures Jo and then Amy on the importance of making a good marriage, but also on having one’s own money. As she belabors this point, one starts to wonder how she came by her own money in the 1800s, but it’s clearly inherited. She’s obviously wealthy and she’s never been married. At Meg’s wedding she’s referred to as Mr. March’s sister, a departure from the book. If Gerwig had thought for just a minute she would have wondered why would Aunt March be wealthy and not Mr. March? If she’s his unmarried sister, she would be under his protection according to 19th century custom and inheritance practices. This may seem like a small thing in the story, but this is the kind of mixed up detail that distracts from the film and makes me throw up my hands in irritation.
Further on, nothing in the story gives any explanation whatsoever for why Jo would develop feelings for Professor Bhaer. She just suddenly realizes he’s the one for her with no exposition of their friendship as offered — slight as it may be — in the book. And why is that? Because, at the end of the film, it is at last revealed that this is the story of Louisa May Alcott and how she became a published successful writer and not really the story of the March sisters. Gerwig has lured us to the theater under false pretenses. I would have been fine with a film about Louisa May Alcott and would have been fine with scenes from Little Women being woven into her story. But to promise me Little Women and give me something less (not much less, but really, insert eyeroll here) was irritating.
Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy serve as a kind of Myers-Briggs for girls and women. We all see ourselves in the various aspects of the March sisters. We identify with their sins: Meg’s envy of her society friends, Jo’s brash rudeness, Beth’s shy and quiet ways that border on fearful, Amy’s self-centered selfishness. We know these girls. We are them and they are us and we will always care for their story. Because when they triumph over adversity, over circumstance, over themselves, so do we. We remember those glorious moments when we became who we were meant to be.
And when their story is not told well or mishandled, it cheats us all of the meaning and charm of their lives.
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Below is a list (by no means complete) of notable versions of this timeless story:
1933 – The legendary Katharine Hepburn as Jo. Spring Byington as Marmee — a noted character actress who later starred as Penny Sycamore in You Can’t Take It With You and in the TV show Laramie. The 1933 version is cited by many as their favorite, but it can only be because of Katharine Hepburn. A curious note for film afficionadoes and trivia mavens: Katharine Hepburn and Saiorse Ronan not only share the role of Jo March, but also that of Mary, Queen of Scots.
1949 – June Allyson (The Stratton Story) as Jo, Peter Lawford (A “Rat-Packer” and President Kennedy’s brother-in-law) as Laurie, an OMG -blonde Elizabeth Taylor (Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?) as Amy, Margaret O’Brien (Meet Me in St. Louis) as Beth, Janet Leigh (Psycho) as Meg, Rossano Brazzi (Three Coins in the Fountain) as Professor Bhaer, Mary Astor (The Maltese Falcon) as Marmee. Allyson and O’Brien were noted for their great crying ability.
1978 (television) – Susan Dey (The Partridge Family) as Jo, Meredith Baxter Birney (Bridget Loves Bernie and Family Ties) as Meg, Eve Plumb (The Brady Bunch) as Beth, and Ann Dusenberry as Amy, and William Shatner (Star Trek‘s James T. Kirk) is Professor Bhaer. Shatner and Dey were a pleasure to watch in those roles. This television version may not be high art, but it’s better than lame iterations that try to modernize the story not to mention the several lifeless BBC productions. (What is the BBC doing making versions of Little Women? Do Americans remake Pride and Prejudice? Come on, people – know your place.)
1994 – Winona Ryder (Stranger Things) as Jo, Christian Bale (Batman Returns) as Laurie, Kirsten Dunst (The Beguiled) as Amy, Susan Sarandon (Dead Man Walking) as Marmee, Gabriel Byrne (The Usual Suspects) as Friedrich Bhaer, and Claire Danes (Homeland) as Beth. Directed by Gillian Armstrong. This is a darling, warmhearted version, beautifully filmed with four young actresses who have lived up to the promise shown in this film. Sarandon’s Marmee was the beginning of highlighting the feminism in the story.
Forced Perspective 