There are so many adaptations of Emma. I’m going to try to cover all four main ones, including this year’s new release. Let’s get started!

Read my review of Emma (the book).

Wasn’t what I pictured

My first impressions of this film were… this is weak. I’ve seen this movie referred to online as the authoritative adaptation of Emma, and I know Gwyneth Paltrow is a big name, but it failed to stand out to me.

The sets felt cramped and small, and too dark. Near the beginning, we watch various groups read the same letter, then see Emma and her father’s backlit silhouettes dismissing guests from a party. Where is the interest? Where are the adaptational changes in story to account for this new media? Where is the lighting??

Maybe I’ve been spoiled by the other movies and miniseries I’ve been watching, where events told in summary in the book are portrayed with more interest and detail on screen… but why didn’t this adaptation do that? (Note: it does improve later in the movie; still, the first half felt dull.)

I’ll be honest, it felt incredibly weird to see Spy Kids’ Fegan Floop (Alan Cumming) as Mr. Elton. I could not take him seriously as a period drama character at all. This effect was worsened by this adaptation’s treatment of the character. Rather than a respected but self-serving clergyman, which I’d pictured, they made him into something goofy, sometimes resembling Mr. Collins. I didn’t hate it, but it’s not the direction I would’ve gone.

The casting and hair/wardrobe of Harriet Smith looked wrong. I’m not familiar with Toni Collette or her work, but for this role — or at least in these hairdos and dresses — she looked too old and not charmingly pretty. Harriet isn’t meant to be gorgeous, but she isn’t supposed to look silly or ridiculous — not like they made her. Many characters in the book think her a rather simple and silly girl when Emma first befriends her, but that is due to her naivety and girlish laughter, not her looks. She was supposed to be pretty! (Harriet’s my favorite in the book. I’m particular about her.)

She felt so silly and below Emma during the deciphering of Mr. Elton’s riddle, and I don’t remember her being so ridiculous and clutzy as the movie makes her. I didn’t like it. (She did grow on me after a while, but that clutzy bit in the sick family’s home did not help.)

Somehow this movie seems to make what felt like a witty, entertaining, zippy plot in the book feel like that tiresome, dull thing so many people accuse classics and period dramas of being. I spent half the movie just wishing it to be over.

You remember all those accusations I’d heard of Emma being unlikable – or worse? Maybe I was too kind in my imagination while reading, but Paltrow’s Emma seems far more manipulative and heartless than the Emma I pictured. The conversational lines certainly were true to the book’s words, but the delivery was… sharp. Cutting. Without compassion. Perhaps this was to emphasize Emma’s character growth as she improves toward the end, but it definitely made her as unlikable as Austen expected.

The pacing of the movie felt accurate considering its length, and every important plot beat was reached, but still it felt both like the story was rushed and the movie lagged. I wonder if perhaps this adaptation focused too much on plot points and not enough on characters and the nuance of their witty conversation that Austen is famous for.

But I did like…

Jeremy Northam plays Mr. Knightley. He was a wonderful romantic hero, and wiser friend for our leading lady and much more likable than the character from the page.

Ironically I think Mr. Knightley was my favorite part of this movie. (I was not a fan of him in the book.) The actor was charming and handsome, and his delivery of lines I’d pictured as grave in the book injected more life and heart in the movie. He and Emma had plenty of chemistry… which I think honestly was at least 75% due to his efforts.

This version of Harriet grew on me a bit more following the portrait painting scene, with her shy smiles and her growing relationship to Emma. She had her sweet, charming moments, I’ll admit.

Sophie Thompson (whom I recall from A Room With a View) made a perfect Miss Bates. Talkative to a fault at times, but still sweet and endearing. Did you know she is actually Phyllida Law’s (this movie’s Mrs. Bates) daughter? And Emma Thompson’s (from Sense and Sensibility, among other things) sister? The more you know.

Mr. Elton’s proposal was amusing. Humorous and quite faithful to the book.

Mrs. Annie Weston, née Taylor, was played well by Greta Scacchi.

When reading the book, I always felt the impression that Emma’s ‘perfection’ was in part due to her own insecurity and her attempts to play the high socialite role into which she was born. I do think the movie captures that in the scene where she frets over not being invited to the Coles’ party.

Holy hair, Ewan McGregor as Frank Churchill was unrecognizable from my Star Wars memories. His voice is a gift from God. Frank didn’t get as much fun attention as he enjoyed in the book, but at least he was pleasant eye candy when he was around.

Frank Churchill’s arrival livened up the story in the movie just as it did in the book. I knew his secret while reading, but it was still harder to watch his and Emma’s flirtations with Jane looking on than it was to read them in the book. Poor Jane. I did enjoy seeing Mr. Knightley’s jealousy. And the interruption of Frank’s almost-admission to Emma! She thinks him in love, he intends to make her his confidante… what a great friendship theirs could have been if he hadn’t been interrupted, though. That could’ve been fun.

The dancing at the ball was well done. A classic period romance scene, with lovely costumes and good framing and lighting.

Emma’s jealousy of Harriet is not a good look, but of course that is too true to her book counterpart.

Juliet Stevenson did the love-to-hate-her, wonderfully entertaining Mrs. Elton justice. Having a narrator at only the beginning and end felt a little strange, especially with Emma’s journaling voiceovers taking that role in the middle, but the narrator reveal twist at the end was definitely fun. No clue why they did that, but I liked it.

Closing thoughts

If I had to sum up what I think went wrong with this adaptation, it was an approach — at least at the beginning — of “we’re putting a book on screen” rather than “we’re making a movie with this story.” Book purists who don’t care so much about directing, set design, and the like and want only a faithful adaptation of a familiar plot will probably still love this movie. For me, it left something to be desired.

That’s not to say there was no artistry to the movie. The archery scene, which at first I found a strange adaptational change, is a great nod both to Emma’s matchmaking penchant as Cupid and her and Mr. Knightley’s very different levels of self-awareness. The cuts in the middle of the movie, between conversations Emma had with Miss Bates, Jane Fairfax, Mr. Knightley, and Harriet were clever and moved the story along well.

The proposal, the best and crowning part of every Austen adaptation, was a joy to watch. The music was beautiful. And I did smile and laugh at times while watching. I just couldn’t shake the feeling, when the movie ended, of… “well, that was boring.”