Bibliofreakblog

Mansfield Park (the Movie)

If you take Jane Austen’s book, Mansfield Park, take out the heroine, Fanny Price, and insert Jane from the movie Becoming Jane, you get this film version of Mansfield Park.  I’m not saying that that’s a bad thing.  It just is what it is.

Now, normally, I am horrified when things are changed in movies adapted from books.  Even when I have not read a book that a movie is based on–such as in this instance, where I have not read Mansfield Park–I still don’t like things to be changed.  Maybe it’s a fear that someday, once I have written and published a book (that’s another story) somebody will come along, buy the film rights to the novel, and completely butcher it in a movie version.  That might seem like a self-indulgent fear, considering I have only written three pages of my novel, but it is a fear I have nonetheless.  

However, in this case, I didn’t think it was quite so horrifyingly disrespectful.  The reasons the changes in Mansfield Park did not bother me so much, include, but are not limited to the following:

• The original Fanny Price, so my internettal (anybody know the adjective form of internet?) research tells me, is shy and lets things happen to her instead of DOING things, and while Jane Austen may have written these attributes intending them to be positive, I just don’t think that translates well for modern audiences.  Being passive = bad these days, while agency is good.
• Fanny’s family is not middle class, they are totally destitute, which adds sympathy, and Mary Crawford’s proposal that hopefully the eldest Bertram heir will die, she’ll marry Edmond Bertram and blah blah blah other nastiness, is revealed in front of the whole family, not privately, which seemed to work well.  Other small details are good too, but since I haven’t read the book, I can’t really comment on them, as these are the ones I noticed from reading online.
• Fanny is basically Jane.  She is a writer, and pieces of the Juvenalia can be spotted throughout the movie.  Like I said, I normally hate this type of thing, but since I don’t think the original Fanny is relatable, it worked for me.

That all being said, has anyone both seen AND read the book?  I’d be interested in your thoughts.

Mansfield Park (1999) at Amazon

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