The story is so rich and dark and sad and beautiful... I fell in love with this book, despite its bitch of an author (which was the reason why it took me 30 years to read this novel in the first place).
The novel's past incarnations on film have seemed literary and stiff, so imagine how excited I was to see that the newest adaptation would focus a little more on the dark nature of the story.
Mr. Rochester had demon eyes in the preview, okay? That's pretty cool.
I went to an advanced screening on Sunday night of Cary Fukunaga's take on the classic followed by a brief Q & A with Fukunaga and Mia Wasikowska. My thoughts:
Firstly, the movie is Tarantino'ed - it starts in the middle and goes back to the beginning via flashbacks. I was not a fan of this idea, because the first thing you see is Jane's darkest moment... which is kind of like kicking the leg out of someone who is just about to conquer Heartbreak Hill in the Boston Marathon.
The style and the tone were excellent, no complaints there... as always Jane's time at Lowood was glossed over with stiff, disjointed friendship moments and then that creepballs scene of Jane and dead Helen in bed together. The whole "let me pick my destiny by putting an ad out in the paper" part was strangely left out, so 19 year old Jane's departure from Lowood is not really met with much explanation. I'm not one for dumbing down movies, but take some notes from the Harry Potter films... there are ways of playing catch up without dumbing down - a fleeting sentence, a voice over or a montage would have done the trick.
Sadly, this was the pace the movie set for itself, a heavy handed "catch up with us" vibe that only seemed to have patience for the more tangible moments in the novel. Here's what I mean:
All the bits of information/narrative threads that were left out of Cary Fukunaga's "Jane Eyre":
- Adele's back story
- Grace Poole
- The Mr. Rochester in drag fortune teller scene
- After the proposal, Jane's rule of everything being normal before the wedding (creating distance, heeding Mrs. Fairfax's advice)
- The shopping spree in town when Jane won't let Mr. Rochester spoil her
- The veil tearing scene when creepshow McGee sneaks into her room
- Jane's anxiety dreams
- Miss Oliver
- St. John taking Jane under his wing to learn Arabic and the strange relationship they form
- The familial connection between Jane, St. John and his sisters (they are COUSINS!!)
- The natural ending to the story...
... in this version, Jane goes back to Thornfield Hall not only to find that it has burned down, but also Mrs. Fairfax and Mr. Rochester still live there. This ending made me mad... not like Dreamcatcher "I, Duddits!" mad, but pretty mad...
Why would they stay at Thornfield after it has burned down?
As a result, the movie (IMO) ended too abruptly... it ends (SPOILER ALERT) with Jane finding Mr. Rochester on the grounds of Thornfield blinded, but with an amazing beard, sitting by "the tree" and she walks up to him and says,
"Hey it's me"
and he's like, "Say what?"
and she's like, "Ya... it's me... I love you"
and he's like "I love you"
And roll credits.
I'm summarizing, really... but you get the idea. So where are they supposed to LIVE?? The burned down Thornfield Hall? And lest we not forget the best part of the book - the confirmation that they DO get married and have kids AND Mr. Rochester regains sight in one eye and they are super deliriously happy!!
But, that is all lost in this version...
After the movie, Wasikowska mentioned that she had been a fan of the book - it shows through her performance... she's hands down the best Jane Eyre I've ever seen.
Our mediator commented on how she has a natural ability to always look like she's 2 seconds away from breaking down, which is definitely an image I had of Jane Eyre when reading the novel. She's trying so hard to keep it together because she's got a mega crush on her master, but can't show any slice of it because she figures she's too foolish to hope for anything between them.
Then he proposes and she's busting with energy, but STILL has to hold it in because Mrs. Fairfax tells her to slow her roll.
And THEN she finds out that he tried to pull a "Big Love" on her and she is so shattered and still trying to hold it together.
Her performance was amazing.
Michael "then we will fight in the shade" Fassbender's performance was very good (but he is a natural talent with a voice infused with sex), so no surprise there.
The combination of all these talented thespians with the intriguing style and tone of the movie seemed like an equation for success, but somehow the movie still fell short.
Cary Fukunaga explained that he wanted to concentrate on other aspects of the story because it's not just a love story - and it's not, that's true... it's a ghost story without a ghost, it's a story about an independent woman creating her own destiny, but it also is still a love story among everything else that it is. If you leave the love part out, why do we care what happens to these two people? Jane could just as easily have run off with St. John and become a missionary's wife, and Mr. Rochester could have died in that fire for all we care... but the point is, we MUST care. When you're given the opportunity to learn everything there is to know about these two weirdos, you realize that they do belong together. Sadly, we're not given the opportunity to care about them like that in this newest inception. Too many important moments were cut out to create the foundation that their strange love is built on.
So, part of me has to wonder if Cary Fukunaga has a romantic bone in his body... I know he has several handsome ones and even funny ones, but he failed to weave the epic love story that is already written in the pages of "Jane Eyre".
Maybe instead of focusing on the more tangible and creepy moments, Mr. Fukunaga could have found inspiration from a hopeless romantic... but then he would have had to be reading from the pages of a different Jane all together?? Hmmmm... yes, quite (smarmy laughter). Zing.
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