Introduction
“Pride and Prejudice" is a novel written by Jane Austen in 1813 with the central theme of romance. The book is centered on Elizabeth Bennet, a girl in a family of five sisters. Mr. and Mrs. Bennet have no son, which puts the family at risk of poverty in their father's demise. His estate is meant to be inherited by a male, forcing the girls to marry a wealthy man to have a good life. This, therefore, is the motivation driving the plot of the novel throughout. The book rotates around the idea of marriage for love compared to societal preferences of marrying for prestige and money. The story has been adapted in Joe Wright's directorial debut film in 2005. The film has won numerous awards, including the Empire, Academy, and Golden Globe awards. This essay will discuss the differences between the story and the motion picture.
Romanticism and family are the central themes in both the film and the novel. However, the film emphasizes realism, which then creates some differences from the original text. The book was written in the 16th century time period contrary to the film. Joe Wright modernized the novel to improve its relation to the millennial targeted audience. The change of the film period to the late eighteenth century was to create a distinction from prior adaptations of the same novel. The film's costumes had to change as the director; Joe Wright was not content with the empirical silhouette dresses in the Regency period (Austen, 173). Together with the hairstyles, the costumes had to please the current generation at the cost of losing accuracy in history. Jane Austen's Elizabeth Bennet is more mature as compared to the film. She is characterized as a bold and impatient girl in the movie as she has the guts to shout at her parents, which does not happen in the book. The novel describes her relationship with her family as open and friendly compared to a secretive film character who grows apart from her sisters. Her emotional attachment to her sister Jane in the novel is top-notch as she confides in her at difficult times and feelings. The director, Joe Wright, is convinced that the most accurate comedy is born from pain, thus drifting the two to improve the audience feeling for her. In the novel, she has a self-realization moment where the author coins the famous line, "Till this moment, I never knew myself." This scene and line are all omitted in the film.
Contrary to the novel, the Bennets appears to be poorer in the film as they reside in a rural setting as opposed to a landed gentry residence in the book. The Bennet sisters dressing in the movie is tattered, which evince poverty. Joe Wright explains that this mess enhances the drama in the clutter in which the family is. Mr. and Mrs. Bennet are illustrated as more sympathetic in the film (Kaplan, 204). Mr. Bennet is a more understanding and attentive father. He is slow to anger and tends to comprehend Mrs. Bennet's mistakes, which is different from the novel's contemptuous mocking character. In general, the family is chaotic in the story, which is changed in the film where the members are loving and more close-knit. Austen's family is unhappy and dysfunctional.
Joe Wright omits some of the film's minor characters to condense subplots in the novel to a single scene. George Wickham's departure with the militia is substantially reduced to reduce screen time for the film. Elizabeth's sister, Lydia Bennet's role has also been given less screen time. Some of the characters are entirely scraped off the film, including Mr. and Mrs. Phillips, Mr. and Mrs. Hunt, and Lady Maria Lucas (Kaplan, 113). According to the director and crew, this was to improve focus on romance, which is the central thesis.
Furthermore, the film aims to enhance realism. Fitzwilliam Darcy's proposals are made more romantic. The location and choice of words aid this. In the first proposal, they are trapped in a neoclassical building in the film compared to the novel where they are in a parsonage. Similarly, the second proposal is set at scenic misty moors in the early hours of the day. In the book, it happens during the day in the middle of the streets. These changes conform to the primary subject matter of the film (Kaplan, 321). At the end of the movie, it does not show a wedding but rather happily married Darcys having a good time at Pemberly. Though before that, it shows them receiving blessings from Mr. Bennet to mean he has approved their union.
Conclusion
Though with several distinct differences, Joe Wright's 2005 film has made headway for the novel. Critics have questioned the motion picture severally for careless customs and conventions of Austen's world. The omission of wit and sense of irony to increase time for romantic melodrama is an example of situations where the film shows disparity from the book. However, the film is praised for popularizing Austen's romantic piece to the new generations. It has also aided in improving modern film-making sensibility in case of another adaptation in the future.
