Sense and Sensibility (1971) 2/4
Jun. 17th, 2025 08:11 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shallownessSense and Sensibility ep 2 – ‘A Parting and a Journey’
Dial it down, Marianne! There wasn’t any nuance to the playing of Marianne in this episode, she was always full on, starting with her dashing to her room after hearing Willoughby’s news that he had to leave (unchaperoned, in Barton Cottage’s living room) and ending with her making a scene at the ball in London.
We were introduced to the Palmers (Charlotte Palmer looked like she could have been Mrs Jennings’s daughter), Mr Robert Ferrars (hateable after one scene!) and the Steele sisters. Lucy was viturepative! ‘Oh, let me befriend you, Elinor, and unload all my intimate concerns about my secret fiancé who hasn’t made me think you’re his favourite, ever, and OUR future.’ As a result, Elinor was a bit more the stoic that we sympathise with, especially because her mother was leaving Marianne turned up to 11 mostly to her because she’s the sensible older sister. (Without a Margaret, Mrs Dashwood was left to decorating the girls’ bedroom as they were carted off to London.)
Knowing the book (and so what he did to Brandon’s ward) means that you are holding Willoughby in contempt so much more than what’s happening on screen text leads you to, where it just looks like he’s led Marianne on and ignored her to get his rich relative’s money. Which is bad enough.
Edward did seem ‘saucy’, trying to keep up with Marianne’s raillery when visiting, in a scene that could have, like most things in this adaptation, done with more nuance. And better blocking, as the actress playing Marianne kept moving to the same spot for no good reason, other than showing that Marianne, thinking ‘future brother in law’ and subconsciously ‘who will treat my sister better than Willoughby is treating me’, was more physically at ease with Edward than Elinor (who didn’t know about Lucy Steele then, but was acting with restraint anyway.)
The difference between shots on location and on set, er, indoors, continues to be noticable, and they almost didn’t have enough space for the dance at the Middletons’, where they’d rigged up a curtain instead of making it look like a ballroom. The director often didn’t seem how to know how to end a scene. But Patricia Routledge continues to play the role of Mrs Jennings to her very fingertips. Oh, and kudos for the realism of showing how travel by carriage from Devon to London couldn’t have been comfortable.
Dial it down, Marianne! There wasn’t any nuance to the playing of Marianne in this episode, she was always full on, starting with her dashing to her room after hearing Willoughby’s news that he had to leave (unchaperoned, in Barton Cottage’s living room) and ending with her making a scene at the ball in London.
We were introduced to the Palmers (Charlotte Palmer looked like she could have been Mrs Jennings’s daughter), Mr Robert Ferrars (hateable after one scene!) and the Steele sisters. Lucy was viturepative! ‘Oh, let me befriend you, Elinor, and unload all my intimate concerns about my secret fiancé who hasn’t made me think you’re his favourite, ever, and OUR future.’ As a result, Elinor was a bit more the stoic that we sympathise with, especially because her mother was leaving Marianne turned up to 11 mostly to her because she’s the sensible older sister. (Without a Margaret, Mrs Dashwood was left to decorating the girls’ bedroom as they were carted off to London.)
Knowing the book (and so what he did to Brandon’s ward) means that you are holding Willoughby in contempt so much more than what’s happening on screen text leads you to, where it just looks like he’s led Marianne on and ignored her to get his rich relative’s money. Which is bad enough.
Edward did seem ‘saucy’, trying to keep up with Marianne’s raillery when visiting, in a scene that could have, like most things in this adaptation, done with more nuance. And better blocking, as the actress playing Marianne kept moving to the same spot for no good reason, other than showing that Marianne, thinking ‘future brother in law’ and subconsciously ‘who will treat my sister better than Willoughby is treating me’, was more physically at ease with Edward than Elinor (who didn’t know about Lucy Steele then, but was acting with restraint anyway.)
The difference between shots on location and on set, er, indoors, continues to be noticable, and they almost didn’t have enough space for the dance at the Middletons’, where they’d rigged up a curtain instead of making it look like a ballroom. The director often didn’t seem how to know how to end a scene. But Patricia Routledge continues to play the role of Mrs Jennings to her very fingertips. Oh, and kudos for the realism of showing how travel by carriage from Devon to London couldn’t have been comfortable.
