Let's have a fangirl freakout over Greta Gerwig's LITTLE WOMEN (Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Florence Pugh, Laura Dern, Meryl Streep, Timothée Chalamet)

The 19th century produced several examples of more recognizably 20th century portraits of feminism: the novels of Charlotte Bronte (Jane Eyre, Shirley, Vilette), her sister Anne (The Tenant of Wildfeld Hall), Wilkie Collins, and Elizabeth Gaskell, not to mention the tough, complicated female characters in George Eliot and Henry James' fiction. Little Women outsold them all because it has a sentimental core inseparable from its aesthetic merit.

I wonder if those with cavils about Gerwig's version have seen the other film adaptations? I haven't seen anyone much mention Cukor and Armstrong's versions. They have scenes that even at the time audience members recoiled from. That's Alcott's material.

something like a doubling down of the opening of jane campion's portrait of a lady, so as to overlay and interweave the feminisms (and other political strands, re class and race and american empire blah blah) of different, more recent eras (1920s, 1970s, now) so that they jaggedly magnify ways the ideals (and loveliness) of the original is part and parcel with bad stuff as well as nice stuff, the ways we now wd heavily judge the LWs then -- and, hardest of all probably, vice versa

A good point, but the framing device using Jo and Dashwood, I think, did that? The closeup of the ink-stained fingers reminded me how some things never change.

ink stained fingers flying over the keyboard

btw I would've killed for a Campion or Sciamma adaptation! Sciamma's Portrait of a Lady on Fire finds the queerness in the conventional 18 th century setting (relationship between tutor/governess/artist and pupil).

Idk, I liked how it is what it is and not trying to be within the wider context? I found Mrs March’s line to the black woman she was working with cringey as fuck, and that’s a Gerwig bit I think? Like the film makes this an observation itself later, when Jo is saying how no one wants to read domestic dramas and Amy disagrees with her.

I heard someone who’d clearly no knowledge of the story hiss “ah Jesus, the sister?!” so Alcott would be pleased to know she’s still boiling people’s piss with that choice ~150 years later.

To me, Mother March has always been the weakest link: the vessel through which a writer/director has communicated his/her "modern" POV, whether in 1933, the forties, 1994, or now; it has tripped up every actress because it's too obvious a Trojan horse for ideas about THE WAY WE LIVE NOW. Laura Dern looked particularly ill at ease because her Dern-ness accentuated what she's supposed to be doing too explicitly; plus, of course, I thought of her feminist speech in Marriage Story.

Outside my comfort zone, to say the least, but well done, and I especially loved the last 10-15 minutes. Great job of capturing the awesome excitement of your book coming to publication, and I love happy endings in general. My brief engagement with classic literature was left behind at university 40 years ago, and Little Women wasn't part of it. So I was sometimes momentarily confused by past-present transitions, and, and I know I shouldn't be, by the relation of Jo March's life to her novel's story--was the story based on her life, or was I watching some kind of framing device? Basic stuff, sorry.

I avoid almost all advance discussion of films I plan to see, so I almost fell off my chair when Bob Odenkirk showed up as the father. Not that he's not a good actor who clearly can adapt to anything, but if you know him from The Larry Sanders Show and Breaking Bad/Better Call Saul--where he basically crawled out of Sweet Smell of Success, at least as relates to the first two--it's a real surprise.

I loved this, and I loved the editing and time transitions, but...where was Odenkirk/Dad when Beth dies? I realize he's not shown in the later timeline until she introduces him returning in the past, but I'd seriously assumed he'd died in the intervening time.

He's at her funeral, so he's around but the story's not about him, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

This was good! The rare new movie I can earnestly describe as "pleasant" without using it as a term to dismiss it.

i really liked this

It's the only acclaimed film of the past four or five I've seen where I'm eager to see it again.

one of them for sure. certainly of the acclaimed films of this year, except maybe Parasite.

I'd be down for a LW/Parasite crossover sequel.

Jane Eyre / Parasite really more reasonable tbh

I expected this to be fine, and it exceeded expectations, even Florence Pugh, who I hadn't remembered was the lead in Lady Macbeth.

Streep should do more of these sharply comic miniatures; she's turning into the Florence Bates of the 21st century.

Ronan should be winning some awards. I liked how GG gave her one quiet "Christopher Columbus" interjection, where Kate Hepburn's Jo bellowed it continuously.

I thought having them kill the Manson family at the end was a step too far, though.

Streep's garnered so many unearned nominations that when she finally gives a precisely comic supporting performance she's ignored.

fits in with disrespect for comedy as well

as for the complaints above, I think this version is as "dangerous" as it needs to be

Dream Team Cast:
Jo: Katherine Hepburn
Amy: Florence Pugh
Beth: Margaret O’Brien
Meg: Trini Alvarado
Laurie: Chalemet
Marmie: Mary Astor
Aunt Marsh: Lucile Watson
Freidrich: Paul Lukas
Mr Laurence: Sir C Aubrey Smith

Best house goes to 49.
Gerwig as director.
33 script.

— Peter Labuza (@labuzamovies) January 26, 2020

I see Astor as Aunt Marsh tho

but she played Marmee in the '49 version (writing in her autobio "What was I doing there?"). He's not free-associating, he's picking all-stars.

i left the movie thinking it was of such little consequence. But now I remember that I really did enjoy the experience, and never once did it bog down to the point that I wished I was somewhere else or was checking my watch, and that is SO rare for me. I guess that means I liked it and it was good.(?)

Chalamet-Hepburn chemistry would be incredible

Chalamet-me chemistry, that’s what I want to see

can't spell chalamet without me

little women cast photographed with 1860 techniques this is the best thing i’ve ever seen pic.twitter.com/viPC2l7Z0q

— alice (@grangershug) February 2, 2020

i thought this movie was sooooooooooo charming, as someone unfamiliar with the text and prior adaptations

I loved it! Although i thought the time-frame jumps may give me a heart failure.

Loved it. Thought it was very “adult” ultimately, like a lot of great children’s media.

Some of the later sequences focusing on jo around beth’s death were very haunting and felt really contemporary in their depiction of loss and bewilderment

I looked at AO Scott's review again and he actually says Chalamet seems "more like a fifth March sister or an untrained puppy" than a love interest. lmfao & otm

to paraphrase a letterboxd comment i read the other day, laurie's a little woman

well less so when he's Christian Bale

mmmm Chalamet and young Bale

an ideal hetero couple

took my daughter to this last night, loved it. The undercutting of the romantic climax with the conversation with the publisher probably the most audacious touch. Cast was uniformly great, Pugh the standout imo

I mean, how do you update an adaptation of a story from the late 1800s, set in the late 1800s, for the 21st century? Give them lasers?

when Friedrich sits down at the piano toward the end, I half-expected him to play some cheeky 20thC pop piece, maybe a Tori Amos song lol

(granted that would've been p jarring)

I thought this was exquisite. I love Ronan and Chalamet's charisma is off the scale. It's worth mentioning, just because I haven't seen anyone else mention it, that Chris Cooper's performance as Mr. Lawrence is very moving.

Came in completeley unfamiliar to the story, previous versions. A few tonal bumps at the beginning I thought but a gorgeous film. Ronan is tremendous.

omg, I had no idea that was Chris Cooper!!

really liked this, super charming; i also never read the book or saw other versions, i can easily see why its a beloved story

gerwig imbues it w a lot of great, fun flourishes that really shine --ie pugh reacts to laurie's advances w/ "ive loved you my whole life" >> scene ends & we jump back 2 pugh as a younger teen making a mold of her foot to remind laurie how petite it is lmao

i enjoyed this when i was watching it but it has felt shallower and more cloying in my memory

Never trust memory.

This should’ve whupped Parasite’s ass except the Academy has snob beef with happy endings

they were both great imo, either would have been a worthy pick

I just feel like I’ll probably watch this several more times and I’ve seen Parasite exactly enough

A ton of recent winners had happy endings

Great work from everyone in the cast and handsome production design, but the shuffled narrative didn't always work for me. Gerwig seemed to want to rush through many of the key earlier scenes from the novel just to get them out of the way (really, this is an adaptation of Book 2, if you follow the original publication history). Still, I can't say I didn't enjoy the experience of watching it.

I'm making a mold of my foot for laurie to remind him I have nice feet