My favorite big screen Jane Austen adaptations remain (in this order) Sense and Sensibility (the 1995 version with Kate Winslet and Emma Thompson), Clueless, and Bridget Jones’s Diary. Somewhere at the other end of this list the Dakota Johnson version of Persuasion, an affair so tedious it would tax Jane Austen herself.
I thought the point of movies was an escape … and escape by making us care for the lives other beings. At the end of Persuasion, I not only cared nothing at all for the players, I even cared less for myself for having watched it.
Anne (Johnson), the forgotten middle child in the Elliot household, had a romance eight years ago that nobody noticed. Eight years later, she’s still not over it. The guy, Wentworth (Cosmo Jarvis), offered her his hand and she turned him down for … reasons. In the time since, he’s become Captain Frederick Wentworth (not only acquiring a title, but a first name to boot!) and she’s spent every night crying into her pillow.
I dunno what Anne was like eight years ago, but right now? She’s a pill. Spiteful Cinderella here is testy and petty. She behaves as if every day is a gift to be opened, unwrapped, and flung into a lake. Oh, look, Wentworth is back! Will he find the same magic he had before with Anne or has becoming a Captain made him an absolute dullard? I suppose both can be true … and are!
We are reintroduced to the passion of their torrid romance when Anne spoils a dinner party with thinly veiled venom. Yeah, babe, that’s gonna get the man back. I wish I could say this was an aberration, but it’s pretty clear 
that this is who Anne has become. Maybe in the early 19th century, bitterness brought all the boys to your yard. That’s the only way to make Sense and Sensibility of this screenplay.
I’ve read that part of the problem with this Persuasion are both the modernization of the screenplay and fourth wall breaks. For me, these enhance the issue without being the issue. My general impression is that the entire cast less the possible exception of Henry Golding behaved as if “this is how one acts in a Jane Austen film” instead of just acting. The stupidity is then enhanced with the camera glances of a modern take as if the actor is trying to confirm whether their performance is acceptable. Very little of this film is acceptable. From the “rambunctious child” scene to the “peeing in the woods” scene, there just isn’t a lot about this picture to like.
Persuasion also violates my #1 rule of screen romance: For it to work, the audience has to want to fall in love with the people falling in love on screen. Will Wentworth return to Anne? Dunno. Don’t care. Neither of these guys is Wentworth your time.
Here’s the thing about fans of Jane Austen
They exist from Tokyo to Boston
But to do the miss right
Locate heroine sight
And the screenplay, don’t be accostin’
Rated PG, 107 Minutes
Director: Carrie Cracknell
Writer: Ron Bass, Alice Victoria Winslow
Genre: Screwing up the classics
Type of being most likely to enjoy this film: Somebody desperately trying to hit on Dakota Johnson
Type of being least likely to enjoy this film: Jane Austen
