Little Women (2019)

When it was announced that Greta Gerwig's second film, after her excellent Lady Bird, would be an adaptation of Little Women, I was a bit crestfallen. This would the eighth film adaptation of the book, and that's not counting TV versions. Why would this fresh new filmmaker turn to this old chestnut? Well, I was wrong. This version of Little Women is superior to the fine one made twenty-five years ago by Gillian Armstrong, and is one of the best films of this or any year.

The story is simple: the four March sisters growing up in Concord, Massachusetts before, during, and after the Civil War deal with romance, death, and trying to fulfill their dreams. Jo is a writer (and the stand-in for the author, Louisa May Alcott), Meg, the oldest, wants a life of domesticity, Beth is musical but also sickly, and Amy is a firebrand who wants to be an artist. During much of the action Mr. March is fighting for the Union Army, so Marmee tries to keep everything together with limited money.

This is a very popular story with girls--boys not so much. In fact, as it is shown in the film, the book was only published when the publisher's daughters implored him to. Gerwig, making this film in 2019, hits on the feminist aspects of the work, as these girls are growing up in a time when marrying well is the only option for financial stability. Jo and Amy seek other alternatives.

Gerwig tells the story in flashback, which is different than the book. She starts with Jo (Saoirse Ronan in New York, writing popular fiction just for the money (she wrote many ghost stories, pirate adventures, etc.) Her fellow boarding house lodger, a German Professor Bhaer (Louis Garrel) tells her she has talent, but that she is wasting her time with these types of stories.

Meanwhile Amy (Florence Pugh) is in Paris with her domineering aunt (Meryl Streep). She is studying painting, but Streep advises her to catch a rich husband. Meg (Emma Watson) is already married, to a penniless tutor (James Norton). And then Beth gets sick.

The story then flashes back to when the girls were younger. They have fun putting on plays and other amusements. A boy moves in next door (Timothee Chalamet) and he will embed himself in the sisters' lives, first falling in love with Jo, who rejects him, and then Amy, whom he will marry. Jo says she will never marry, but her publisher (Tracy Letts) advises her to have her heroine marry at the end of her book. She agrees, and in a bit of meta-fiction, we understand that though Jo will marry, Alcott never did--she married off Jo for the book, but not in real life.

Little Women begins a bit disjointedly, and takes a little while to get used to. The time hopping can be confusing, as Beth gets sick twice. Thankfully we are helped in telling these time periods apart by the length of Jo's hair, as she sells it to make money. This non-linear storytelling makes this adaptation stand out from others, as it becomes a film about memory and ties together the bond that the sisters feel for each other.

The acting is excellent. Ronan, of course, is the lead, and terrific, but Pugh really steals the show. In many adaptations she is played by two actresses (she was in the '94 version) because she is the youngest, but Pugh handles both ages of her character, and she is both impetuous (angered over not being invited to a party, she burns Ronan's novel-in-progress) and forward thinking, as she delivers a speech about how she is angry that marriage is her only option at financial success.

Watson is also good, though it's interesting that a big star such as her plays the dowdy character. Laura Dern is very good as Marmee, and her line about her being angry every day of her life, while in the book, seems to take on new life in this post-feminist adaptation.

Everything else about the film, such as the music, the costumes, the decor, and the lighting, is marvelous. Almost all of it takes place in winter, so we almost shiver as we see them dressed in layers, with candles burning, and watching Jo scribble by diminishing candlelight makes us wonder how she didn't lose her eyesight. Gerwig creates a world that is most authentic.

So, if you are a man and reluctant to see this because you don't think it will speak to you, banish those thoughts and go see this film. It's that good.