Becoming Jane: sorry, hated it

There aren’t so many films I hate but I was awfully disappointed when I recently watched this on DVD. It has very little to do with Jane Austen in my opinion.
First of all, I don’t believe in the story with Tom Lefroy, but at least they could have made the story emotional and appealing. This, on the contrary was a trivial melodrama about two infatuated young people, and the plot was very boring, I found myself falling asleep towards the middle of the movie. Another reason why I might not like it was that James McAvoy is not my type. Absolutely. And I don’t think a Tom Lefroy like this could attract Jane as she really was so much she would consent to an elopement. But then – and here comes the biggest complaint – this Jane was not much of the Jane I picture. Indeed, Anne Hathaway is pretty and sometimes you sympathise with her heroine, but she’s not Jane Austen, just a good romantic girl, at times outwardly passionate about her principles (like Marianne Dashwood), who likes to write a page or two occasionally, with nothing extraordinary in her. Where’s Jane’s wit and her observation? The real Jane who wrote brilliant parodies on popular romances when a teenager would have been different and definitely more interesting. The real Jane hardly needed a critic like Tome Lefroy to prompt her burn her early manuscripts and to influence her writing. And she surely wrote other novels besides “Pride and Prejudice”, though not a word was said in the film about it! The creators of the film chose to overlook that and took whole episodes and characters from “P&P”. How very original, especially that these two young people were much less interesting than Lizzy and Darcy. And one did not even care to use JA’s letters to Cassandra where she writes about Tom Lefroy. (Jane's letters? Why use authentic material if we could make up a story ourselves?) Cassandra in the film is another big complaint: 1) where’s Jane’s relationship whith Cassandra in the film at all? 2) she was just totally miscast, the actress was much better as Bessy in the “North and South”, even if different from the Bessy in the book.
I have some issues with “Mansfield Park” 1999, starring Frances O’Connor, but her heroine (a mixture of Fanny and real Jane, they used her letters and early works in the film) is a deeper and more interesting portrayal of a young heroine who writes. Again, I was not very enthusiastic about the recent “P&P” with Keira Knightley and did not exactly recognize the book by JA I know (though the plot was preserved rather accurately), but at least it made a cute period romantic comedy (not boring!) and was worth watching it for what it is and for the fun comparing with the book (Mr Darcy, a proud owner of Pemberley, sitting in an opened jacket in the yard, chickens around him, waiting for the results of his beloved’s interview with her father, lol!). But this film was an insipid portrayal of Jane and a very unoriginal love story even if you forget it’s a biopic (I did not feel any chemistry at all and kept myself asking what she found in that boy!)). A good idea poorly executed. It has been the second time I’ve hated a JA-related item I bought. Previously I was disappointed by “The Jane Austen Book Club”. But I kept it for the quotes on Jane Austen listed after the novel. This DVD does not have any bonuses why I should keep it, I’m actually thinking to pass it over to someone. Good that I got it cheap. One could use the DVD as practical material if writing a paper on movie translations and dubbing though, because I found some translation mistakes there. I could guess what there was in the original from the mistakes they made in the Russian dubbing, even though the English voicetrack was completely deleted. I liked the film stills where Jane is writing or reading, they looked so inspiring, but since there wasn’t much interesting about her becoming a writer there I’m now thinking the title of the movie is a little inconsistent. The Germans translated it as “Geliebte Jane” (“Beloved Jane”) and I think did the right thing. It was wisely titled “Jane Austen” in Russian, a “play-safe”variant ;-)

I guess I have to insert a picture too. I cropped it to leave Tom Lefroy out because I dislike him ;-)

P.S. Compared to "Becoming Jane", "Miss Potter" was a much better biopic of a writer, I even cried a lot over that sweet litle film. Will make a review next time!