Word: mcgrath
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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There comes a point when, for health reasons, one has to cease getting furious at Hollywood for mangling great novels and instead allow a movie version to stand on its own. This season's Austen fare, "Emma," adapted and directed by Douglas McGrath, borrows the book's social satire, but unwisely replaces its canny ironic bite with what in comparison resembles absurd slapstick. We can enjoy the product of this limited adaptation--funny, outrageously decorated--but it's anything but great Austen...
Advertised as an alternative to summer blockbusters, the movie lets you feel smart for having laughed at something weighty by poking fun at the problems of class in Austen's England. In choosing his material, McGrath obviously revels in mocking the characters' indulgences, and nowhere does he have more of a field day than with the picture-book world he believes the characters inhabit: endlessly decorated lawns, trees, countrysides, even the people themselves. Characters seem absurd just walking by such a background...
...seems overdone, even more so than McGrath plainly intends you to think. Seeing the silly playthings of the idle rich (well, Emma's not that idle) such as archery equipment is one thing, but showing what are apparently fishbowls as part of the outdoor luxury goes a bit far. It's as if we're seeing the result of McGrath's reactions to the book ("Wow, how outrageous it all is! Get me rewrite!") rather than any nuanced depiction of the world itself...
...youth allows you to forgive Emma," says McGrath, for whom Paltrow was the only choice. "When you think of other actors who are 21, your options aren't promising. You have a grim poster staring you in the face. It's like, 'Shannen Doherty is Emma'? I don't think...
Could two roles be farther apart than Ginnie and Emma? Nonetheless, the first part helped her get the second. "I grew up in Texas," McGrath says, "and my friends and I used to just kill ourselves laughing when movie actors did Texas accents. People always sounded like the Clampetts. But Gwyneth did the most impeccable Texas accent in Flesh and Bone. She has an amazing ear. And, of course, everything else is perfect. Her speaking voice is a beautiful instrument, and she photographs like a dream--all the light goes to her on the set, and she seems to absorb...