So have you seen the latest
adaptation of Jane Austen's Emma? It was put out in 2020. And I feel like there are so many
different opinions about this movie. But today I'm going to be giving you
mine in this review of Emma 2020. My name is Ellie Dashwood and this is
my channel where I talk about history, classic literature and writing. If you like any of those
things, please subscribe. The opinions about Emma
2020 are so polarized. It either is that the extreme side of,
"Oh, it's the best movie ever made" or the exact opposite of, "Emma 2020 classifies
as one of the catastrophes of 2020." First, I want to dive
into an analysis of it. So first, just talking
about visually, this film is absolutely stunningly gorgeous. But I feel like it's incredibly
stylized and unrealistic. For example, if you look at Pride and
Prejudice 2005, which is a stunning film too, they did it in this very natural,
organic way that was a super believable. Meanwhile, Emma feels like a
Tim Burton movie meets someone's art school graduate project. We see that through the sets,
through the color scheme. There's a very definite color
scheme running through every single scene of that movie. The other thing I want to talk about
is that they really were going for a comical perspective of Emma, a little bit. I noticed that especially earlier
in the film in certain scenes, such as when she's holding the baby. They went to extremes in this movie. Jane Austen is always actually kind
of comical, but she does it in this very like understated, subtle way. While this movie definitely brought that
out in an extreme form, they left all subtlety at the door and just went for it. And the servants, I feel like the
servants were partially there for comic effect, but I feel like there
was some underlying social commentary. They were trying to give about how
the rich people are really spoiled and they're just like demanding
on their servants and ordering 'em around and constantly waited on. And while I understand that's
what they were trying to portray. I feel like it was done in the super
unrealistic way, because really servants were workers who had real jobs. They had real responsibilities. They had duties. They just did not stand around all day,
waiting for people to give them orders. They already had their orders. That's why, if somebody wants
one of them, they have to ring a bell because they're busy. That's the whole point of servants. Well, meanwhile, it seems like the
servants in this version of Emma, stand there 90% of their life. So one of the great things about
Jane Austen movies is a lot of them all have very stereotypical parts. There's always the ridiculous clergyman. The dad who's not always helpful
when it comes to romance. Or the untrustable rogue. So wouldn't it be great if, while
watching your favorite Jane Austen film, you could play Jane Austen Bingo, where
the squares are Jane Austen tropes, and you can play against your family
and friends and see who wins first. Well guess what? I made Jane Austen Bingo for you. You can download a free printable PDF
pack of Jane Austen bingo cards, but by signing up for my newsletter, from
the link in the description below. It is a very fun if I do say so myself. Admittedly, I'm made it, so
I might be slightly biased. But definitely get your free
Jane Austen Bingo pack today by signing up for my newsletter. From the link below, like I already said. So next up, I want to talk about, I
think the biggest issue most people have with this movie, which is Emma herself. Now, the characterization of
Emma is a perfect example of them taking something to the extreme and
adapting it to modern sensibilities. Because when we look at Emma that Jane
Austen wrote, I feel like, basically, she's this good hearted girl who has
been a bit spoiled in her childhood. She thinks too well of herself,
but overall she's 90% good and cares about other people and
wants to be helpful and loving. And I think that's why people love Emma. So I feel like they came into this
version and were like, "Oh, well it says she's arrogant and stuck up
and has all these lessons to learn. Let's make her the most souretst
brat on the entire planet, because if I described a person in 2020,
the way they describe Emma, this is what I think she would look like." Now. I think we have to go back to realizing
that Jane Austen's Regency world had an entirely different scale of morality and
character and what people should be like. So I'm going to give you an example
of this, which is the famous hand flex scene from Pride and Prejudice 2005. Where, you know, Darcy helps Elizabeth get
into the carriage and their hands touch. And then his hand flexes
when he walks away. Cause it's like, "Ah,
I touched Elizabeth!" So some Regency people would be
like Elizabeth and Darcy were just totally getting physical. This is quite scandalous. Well, I feel like too in Regency
times they had the getting physical level of Lydia running away with
Wickham and shacking up in London. So they're getting physical scale, went
from hand touch to shacking up in London. Okay. So thinking about this scale, for
example, Emma's personality of being sort of arrogant and stuck up, we have
arrogant and stuck up to being the worst person alive in the most sourest ever. See how there's a scale there. Emma's personality flaws
were more like hand flex 2005 version of character defects. And they came in in this Emma 2020 and
made her the equivalent of Lydia shacking up with a Wickham in London defects. They did this because in 2020, our
era, we don't really have hand flex. Right? And if people are getting physical
and movies in 2020, they're literally shacking up in London together. When they read Emma's character, they
translated it through the perspective of 2020, which I feel like greatly distorted
who she was and made her kind of a really unlikable for a lot of the movie. This caused a problem with Emma's
personality overall, because it caused a contradictory confusing
situation that required a complete suspension of disbelief to accept. Because here we have them trying to adapt
Emma of the book who acts and behaves in a very good hearted way, especially in
a lot of the vital scenes of the book. And they're trying to make her look
like this completely stuck up brat. But then it's almost like she has to
have this dual personality of where she's a stuck-up brat, most of the scenes. And then all of a sudden, a major scene,
like I talked about would come along and she had to completely flip her personality
to behave like Emma did in the book. And then she like flips back to
being a stuck-up brat and continues. It required, yeah for me to essentially
be like, "I see what they did there. It doesn't work, but I'm just going
to have to accept this, that that's what they did ." I feel like too,
they took Emma's overall story arc and they changed it in an interesting way. Throughout the entire book of Emma,
she learns lessons gradually as she comes across different, important
mistakes she makes in her life, which I feel like is what we do as humans. Right? We learn this lesson and
then we learn that lesson. And then we learn this lesson. Where Emma in the movie sort of
sails through a lot of the lessons. For example, Harriet's
first heartbreak over Mr. Elton. She's not that upset about it. Even Harriet doesn't seem
that upset about it, honestly. So all this doesn't phase
her that definitely had major effects on her, in the book. Until the scene after Box Hill, which
is when she's very mean to Miss. Bates and Mr. Knightley lectures her. And so then all of a sudden she totally
has all the life lessons all at once. And she's just so heartbroken about it. And that created very unnatural
story arc and something that was definitely different from the book. And it also caused a lot of deviations
from the book, because again, I think they were trying to make it more
acceptable to our modern sensibilities. I think we especially see
this from the point where Mr. Knightley proposes on. She goes and she directly interferes
with Robert Martin's second proposal by being like, "Hey, I have to confess
to you and you should go propose." That does not happen in the book. And I don't think it would
happen in Regency England. And then again, Emma's personality
problems presented themselves in the Emma-Knightley relationship. Which was Knightley loves Emma, because
her heart's basically good in the book. And yes, he lectures
her a lot on her faults. But as imperfect humans,
we all have many faults. Now in this movie, I'm just
like," Why does he like Emma? On what planet does Mr. Knightley like this girl
who acts like this?" And I was watching a movie
with my sister and she agreed. It's like, "What on earth does Mr. Knightley see in this version of Emma?" And I think that significantly
hurt their romance in the movie. At least for me. Also, Emma's a lot more
flippant and rude to Mr. Knightley in this version. Now let's talk about Mr. Knightley for a minute. I feel like Mr. Knightley's character
development was a very low. We didn't get to see a lot of those
great defining moments where he is the definition of a gentleman. I feel like when I think of
Knightley, that's what I think of. He is 100% what a gentleman should be. And I don't think we saw that
in this movie, but you know what we did see in this movie? Mr. Knightley's butt. Why? Who was like, "You know what Emma needs? Naked, Mr. Knightley. Right? It's brilliant." My mom pointed this out, which
is they were trying to get the rating score up on Emma. Because if you take out the, I don't
know, half a second scene of Mr. Knightley changing his clothes
and being naked, there's nothing else that would have raised the
ranking of Emma from G to PG 13. And so I feel like some movies do
this, throw in a cussword here or there in order to up their ranking. Because apparently people don't
want to see rated G movies. I don't know. G movies are the best guys. So too, if you look at the romantic
misunderstandings or development in this movie in general, it's
very hard to understand if you don't know the background of Emma. For example, Mr. Churchill and Emma flirt a lot more, I
think, in the book and in other versions of Emma, that you understand why Mr. Knightley thinks that Emma likes Mr. Churchill. But in this one, it's so
subtle that you could miss it. And then it's the same thing with Mr. Elton. Mr. Elton hitting on Emma is so
subtle, you could miss it. And I feel like that
greatly hurts the film. Again, let's talk about deviations in
the Emma-Knightley relationship, such as their very romantic dance at the ball. And then he runs after
her all the way home. And they have those moment where you feel
like they both know they like each other. But then all of a sudden
it's like, wait, no, Mr. Knightley thinks that she likes Mr. Churchill. And Emma thinks that he likes Harriet. But really, I feel like after that whole
ball scene, that's not really believable. It's like, first of all, both
of those things are so subtle. While the ball scene is so extreme. How could you be confused? Right. And so I feel like the deviations
and extremes or subtlety of leaving things out definitely hurts the
understanding of the plot line. So also, I just want to take a minute
and talk about Jane Fairfax, who comes off in this version as very stuck up
and antagonistic towards Emma versus usually being a shy reclusive person,
who's hiding a secret in a stressed out. Because if you read the final scene
between Jane Fairfax and Emma in the book, that scene could never happen
between Jane and the Emma of Emma 2020. And I don't really understand why
they did this to Jane Fairfax, except for the fact that I feel like they
were trying to maybe show her as a more empowered version of Jane. Because Jane, I feel like can come
off as very passive in the book. But then again, Jane Austen did not
write it empowered Jane Fairfax. Now, did she. No. Between that and also how
Harriet's storyline ends. Harriet, I feel like is also much
more empowered by the end of this movie than she is by the book. And the change in Emma,
where she's suddenly adopting more modern sensibilities. I feel like all of this just shows that
the movie makers were not happy with the way that Jane Austen ended Emma and they
wanted a more modern finish to the story. The final thing, I'm going to talk about
the storyline, just one major thing, which is, all the kissing at the end. It's like, this is the Emma or everyone's
making out at the end of the movie. But seriously, I think it was a very
interesting choice to end it that way. So overall, I ended up liking this
movie more than I thought I would. And I feel like part of that came from
the fact that I went into watching it with such low expectations. I was like, "I'm going to 100% hate this." That when I only like 70%
hated it, I was like, "Oh, wow, that was surprisingly good." The more I watch it, the more I like it. But it requires me again to have
this complete suspension of disbelief that this characterization of Emma is
even humanly possible in one person. It also requires me to accept the highly
stylized look and just go with it. And again, I think it does require an
understanding of Emma's true storyline to fill in the gaps of the confusing parts. But of course my favorite version of Emma
will always be BBC's Emma, 2009, unless the BBC puts out an even better version,
which I don't know if they possibly can. So let me know in the comments below
what you think of Emma 2020 and what is your favorite version of Emma? Again, my name is Ellie Dashwood. This is my channel and keep being
awesome because you're awesome.
