Carrie Cracknell, director. Persuasion (2022) Netflix

This adaptation of Jane Austen’s novel Persuasion shows a modern take on the late 1700s English life. The film has Anne, the heroine of the story breaking the fourth wall to become the narrator of the story. This is an attempt to make the readers understand who are which characters, Anne’s impression of them, and to fill in the readers about information that they might not know if they had not read the novel. Which is one of the ways that makes Anne feel like she does not fit in with her family. She is also dressed differently from her other family members, which also gives her a feeling of not belonging to her family. She is usually dressed in less fancy and showy clothes because she does not think that money and status is as important, unlike her father and her sister, Elizabeth. She is also seen wearing more blues and darker colors than her family, which gives her more of a sense of moodiness of Anne’s character.

Due to this film being more recent than other adaptations of the novel, there are also more modern ideas and thoughts that would not happen in the time period that the film is supposed to be. For example, the accents and language are more modern and also have more of a modern American accent than what would have been used. This can be seen when Anne is talking to Lady Russell about William Elliot. Anne calls him a “10” like how today we use a number scale to describe how good or bad we think people are. There are also more passionate moments in the film that were not in the novel as well. There are many points in the film that the characters were kissing which each other that were not in the film but were there so modern viewers can understand and relate to the storyline better than if they would have read the novel.

(reviewed by Addison Esser)