Pride
And Prejudice (1996)
A&E
Cast:
Colin Firth, Jennifer Ehle, David Bamber, Crispin Bonham-Carter,
Julian Swalha.
Rating:
G.
Run
time: 310 mins
Genre:
The ultimate romantic drama.
Verdict:
Brilliant
(see rating
system)
The
definitive BBC TV version of the classic Jane Austen novel
sweeps all other pretenders aside.
Colin
Firth (Bridget Jones's Diary, Love Actually) is perfect as
the seemingly cold and haughty Mr. Darcy and Jennifer Ehle
is superb as the spunky Elizabeth Bennet, who gives as good
as she gets in their verbal sparring.
Of
course, it helps to have a leisurely five hours to tell the
story - an advantage over the many theatrical versions which
simply must cut out so much to focus on the unlikely growing
romance between Darcy and Elizabeth.
In
this version, you really get to know all the colourful characters
that populate the story and can understand the family and
class dynamics at play during the early 19th century.
Elizabeth
is one of five unmarried daughters of a respected country
"gentleman" in a world in which obtaining a good
marriage is paramount. Elizabeth's father (Ben Whitrow) is
comfortable, but not wealthy. That makes the task of getting
them married off more difficult. Her excitable mother (Alison
Steadman) is obsessed with finding her daughters husbands
- to the point of embarrassing her family.
When
the eligible bachelor Charles Bingley (Crispin Bonham-Carter)
moves into the community, Mrs. Bennet goes into action and
is delighted when he takes a fancy to her daughter Jane (Susannah
Harker). But Bingley's friend Darcy (Firth), disparages the
locals and declares there are no beautiful women who could
tempt him. But he is already uncomfortably aroused by the
feisty Elizabeth, who clashes with him at every meeting.
A
story packed with incident, family crisis and insight into
the nature of love and relationships, this version boasts
superb locations, great stately homes, magnificent costumes
and fine performances from a big cast. There's also a nice
score by composer Carl Davis.
The
2-disc edition includes featurettes on the making of the film
It's
the best!
