“Little Women” from Greta Gerwig
Jo March reflects back and forth on her life, telling the beloved story of the March sisters - four young women each determined to live life on their own terms.
9/10
This is a coming-of-age period drama adaptation of a novel written in 1868 by Louisa May Alcott.
When I first heard that Greta Gerwig was writing a screenplay and planned to get the film produced, I knew I was going to watch it the moment it was released. I saw Ladybird (also written and directed by Greta) and was really intrigued by how “Greta” it was… which is a strange thing to say about someone’s directorial debut, but there I was. I just thought that her vision was so strong in all filmic aspects that I was hopeful we might be seeing an auteurial debut as well.
And by that, I mean to say — not every artist is an auteur. Pre-requisites to the label include having a body of work, primarily, in which consistent cinematic elements can be identified. If you did a blind date with a movie and were presented with an obscure Tim Burton film, you’d know that it was his if you were familiar with his other works. What I think is really impressive is that with two films, Greta’s kind of already established a fledgling auteur’s consistency. Tim Burton has duality between contrasting worlds, accompanied by grotesquery and misunderstood characters, while Greta Gerwig (hopefully it’s not too early to call) has plot driven by character growth, nostalgic art style, and a headstrong female lead. I think that if I hadn’t known it was from Greta, I would have seen Little Women and thought to myself that it was reminiscent of the overall tone and impact of Lady Bird.
So, that’s what to expect if you go to see this film. I’ve given it such a high rating because there really wasn’t much that I think the film could have done better. I loved the themes and the story. The characters all felt so real — I aspire to be able to present characters the way Greta has, where in an introductory scene you already feel an understanding of who they are and you already care about what is going to happen to them as a result of that perceived intimacy. A lot of that credit must also go to the actors, whose performances were stunning. I also adored how delicately character emotions and the story arc were handled. You know when you go to see a film and you leave feeling somewhat patronised? When every foreshadowing is exaggerated; shots linger too long on character reactions; sometimes, plot points are drilled into you so many times you just know that the film team either thought you would miss it or they were so proud of their clever twist that they had to remind you that it’s happening? I’d use the word ‘clumsy’ to describe that sort of patronising film, which is why I used the word ‘delicate’ to describe how Little Women seemed to me. And one thing I don’t think we’ll ever catch Greta Gerwig doing is making an ending too neatly tied up — personally, I love when a story ends in a way that is both satisfying but also not too over-dictated, or with a sense of false perfection (ie. all of the characters’ problems just evaporate with the resolution). It lets the film retain some sort of life in your memory rather than being an open and closed story, if that makes sense.
That said, I will mention that the only issue that I remember taking away from this film was actually the result of a little bit too much ‘laissez-faire’ for me. I’ve been somewhat vague with my praise so far to avoid spoilers, but I will be explicit here so if you haven’t seen it and plan to, now is the time to mosey on out.
There’s a romantic story arc between Amy and Laurie that I feel needed a bit more TLC to be convincing. I get that there was some set-up — Amy always wanted to hang out with him when she was a teen; she introduced herself eagerly when they first met; their chance encounter in Paris was very enthusiastic (and Meryl Streep’s character pointed it out disapprovingly).
But still… Amy has a line when they’re at the park later on in the film where she explodes with:
“I have been second to Jo my whole life in everything and I will not be the person you settle for just because you cannot have her. I won’t do it, not when, not when I’ve spent my entire life loving you.”
Well. That meme where the blond guy’s blinking and shaking his head in surprise? That was my reaction. At this point, I wasn’t completely blindsided by the introduction of romance between them because I’d just already been blindsided by the sensual unbuttoning of her painting apron in the scene beforehand. But to claim she’s always been in love with him? I just don’t think the screenplay adequately did the groundwork to spring that on the audience.
Pretty much everyone I’ve spoken to about the film has actually disagreed with me on that, but I do have two specific reasons for saying this.
Firstly, like I said, I get that there were hints leading to the moment, but I think they were too vague and (more importantly) too noncommittal. I didn’t assume that Amy’s FOMO as a teenager was because of a crush on the male character — I just took it as generic my-sisters-get-to-go-to-a-party-and-I-want-to-go-too-FOMO. Making a point of introducing herself to Laurie when he helps Jo and Meg home? Surely there’s nothing in that! Everyone introduced themselves to the stranger who helped a member of their family. Meryl Streep’s disapproval? Honestly, given the period drama’s theme of rejecting traditional gendered expectations, I thought it was a plot device to highlight how a woman being affectionate is too often quickly and wrongly perceived as flirtatious. Amy deciding to sketch Laurie the time they all went to the beach together? Does that come off as a romantic choice? Perhaps if another character has teased her about it and she reacted to the suggestion in an interesting way it could have, but that didn’t happen — she was just sketching a friend and there was no reason to assign anything more to it.
At any rate, my second reason is somewhat of an extension or compliment to the first. While I believe the plot hints were non-committal and that was a problem in this case, I wouldn’t say that non-committal hints are always going to do a poor job of setting something up. Sure, in retrospect, I can connect the dots. That’s the point, right? But the mental process after the “I’ve always loved you” revelation shouldn’t be a “Oh wait — what?” moment, it should be a “Oh! That explains a lot” moment. That’s the dramatic pay-off.
I think the reason why it didn’t result in the latter for me is because the question the film asked right at the beginning was: “What happened between Jo and Laurie?”. So, I didn’t think anything of the moments in the plot where Amy’s behaviour could maybe indicate romantic interest because that wasn’t what the film seemed to be setting up — until, of course, much later when “Wait, is there something between Amy and Laurie?” is almost immediately answered with “Of course, she’s loved him all along”.
Their relationship, however, was my only qualm. I intend to read the book and, after looking over some of the summarised differences between Gerwig’s adaptation and Louisa May Alcott’s original novel, I think that I’ll find that I’m not wrong in suspecting that the film just didn’t have enough time to spend on Amy and Laurie. Plot summaries describe Amy “inspiring Laurie to find his purpose” and Laurie “slowly falling in love” with her, which sounds like their romantic progression is a lot more believable in the literary version.
I suppose I’ll have to find out — I’ll post a review of that once I’ve had the chance to read it. Still, overall I haven’t enjoyed watching a film so much in a while, and I heartily recommend “Little Women”.
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