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During the 1990s I read dozens of the classic 19th century novels (though not Sense and Sensibility). I also watched numerous TV/Film adaptations of them, but I gave up on those by the middle of the decade as the film makers never seemed to do the original justice.

The problem, it seemed to me, was that the BBC or Merchant Ivory had spent so much on getting the interior decor and costumes just right that they wanted this stuff to be on the screen for minutes at a time, so it was often like watching a filmed play with little camera movement or even much use of close ups. To me a Dickens novel with manic characters and tremendous energy should be filmed like the opening 20 minutes of Goodfellas.

So it's interesting to hear that a director like Ang Lee managed to actually enhance the source material and I will make time to watch it.

Strangely, just after reading this article I caught a bit of Piers Morgan's YouTube debate show which featured a white lady complaining about white privilege. I thought 'who is this loon ?' and so googled and found her name was Myriam Francois, a Muslim convert who campaigns for hate speech laws. But in the 1990s she was child actress Emilie Francois who had 'earned critical acclaim as Margaret Dashwood in Sense and Sensibility'.

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Recently watched a late 90s adaptation of Mrs Dalloway starring V Redgrave and one of the Ruperts. Her house was dressed very nicely but it all felt like the tail end of costume drama gold rush and was pretty limp to sit through. Admittedly it must be a tough book to put on film.

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haha yes! I remember looking up what happened to her and was very surprised

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Thank you for the recommendation! My wife and I watched it last night and really enjoyed it.

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Awesome

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Shows what a klutz I am. I saw that movie 30+ years ago (I'm guessing) and enjoyed it. I never thought about such richness. I was completely engrossed in the story.

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I’m delighted I was able to highlight it

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