‘Pride And Prejudice’ And Good Film Adaptations

‘Pride and Prejudice’ is one of my favourite Jane Austen novels, only just behind ‘Persuasion’, and right ahead of ‘Sense and Sensibility’. I love everything about this book, and I especially love watching the BBC miniseries adaptation. Every time I’m sick and in bed, I pull out the miniseries and give it a rewatch. It’s like comfort food, warm and satisfying. It’s been a while since I last read the novel, but I remembered it as a really excellent book, a memory that was validated when I recently gave it a reread. There’s something so engaging about this book with its varied cast of characters, its familiar, comforting settings, and the story it weaves. It’s no wonder this book has stayed so popular.

As I reread ‘Pride and Prejudice’, sinking into the comfort of the familiar story, I found the scenes and characters from the BBC miniseries filling in the details for me. They compliment each other so well, the novel and the miniseries. Obviously, the miniseries, while faithful, is not an exact reproduction. Certain things have been tweaked or changed so that the story can be effectively translated to the screen. However, what it does really well is capture the spirit and vivacity of the original novel. It’s faithful not only in dialogue and story beats, but in the way it captures the heart of the book. I enjoy the miniseries because I’ve read the book, but I also enjoy the book more because I’ve watched the miniseries.

And I think, that is one of the marks of a really good film adaptation. Not that it’s a word for word recreation of the source material with no detail left out. Doing that often leaves you with a film that’s bloated and constrained by the original book. The translation between book and screen just can’t be that exact. Each tells a good story in its own way. What a good film adaptation does is stay faithful to the spirit of the story and capture its essence so well that they feel like two sides of the same story. 

There are some great film adaptations that are wildly different from the source novel.  How to Train Your Dragon is a great example of this. The movie is so completely different from the original book that I wouldn’t imagine the movie while reading the book, certainly, not in the same way that the BBC mini series of Pride and Prejudice so perfectly encapsulates the spirit of the novel. Or The Lord Of The Rings films manage to capture the story from the books without being completely bound to every event and character. But How To Train Your Dragon is a really good movie in its own right, despite being so different, and I would call that a success of a different sort.

But the best film adaptations are the ones that start with a story and chance your enjoyment of it. They might have to tweak things, shuffle events slightly, add or subtract characters, and the like. But they understand the heart of the story and capture its spirit in such a way that you watch the film and the read the book and feel that yes, they are the same story. One compliments the other. Whether you watch the movie or you read the book, you’re experiencing the same story. And I think that is the mark of a great film adaptation. It’s not whether every line of dialogue, every event, every detail is rendered on the screen, but whether it captures the true heart the book and adds to the story, rather than taking away from it.

What is your favourite film adaptation? And which is your favourite Jane Austen novel?