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Average User Score: 7 (23 sources)

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vamp-luvr

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Good but sad story. The casting was perfect. McAvoy does a good job in being charming, and Hathaway in being stubborn.

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Posted nov 2, 2008 2:43 pm pt

chinadollM9

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The film started off focusing on Jane's desire to be a novelist.

James McAvoy did a incredible job being Jane's love, Mr. Lefroy.

The emotion going on between James and Anna was intense. I felt that with each kiss it was...
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The film started off focusing on Jane's desire to be a novelist.

James McAvoy did a incredible job being Jane's love, Mr. Lefroy.

The emotion going on between James and Anna was intense. I felt that with each kiss it was actually happening to me.

The film did begin to focus on the story that Jane's desire to marry Mr. Lefroy but did not and was never married. I found that very sad!

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Posted feb 19, 2008 1:48 pm pt

sonicboom713

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Austen’s Tale Retold, Sort Of

By Patrick Hickey Jr.

For all of you Jane Austen fans out there looking for the one movie to quench your need to find out everything you ever wanted to know about the amazing female...
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Austen’s Tale Retold, Sort Of

By Patrick Hickey Jr.

For all of you Jane Austen fans out there looking for the one movie to quench your need to find out everything you ever wanted to know about the amazing female author, it’s not going to be found in “Becoming Jane.� While you will have a good time sitting through the film, the feeling that it could have been something much more special is hard to avoid.

A more fictitious attempt to fill in the blanks of a woman’s life that has reveled in the unknown for quite sometime, writers Kevin Hood and Sarah Williams, both of whom made their big-screen writing debuts with this film, decided to take the film on a surreptitious journey through Austen’s writing career that eventually wound up focusing more on her desire to fall in love than anything else.

Making a huge social commentary on the rudimentary laws of inheritance in the 19th century, which forced young women to marry rich men to financially help their ailing families, Austen, played by Anne Hathaway [Devil Wears Prada, Princess Diaries] looks to find a man that will both satisfy her need for emotional and physical sustenance while helping her mother and father, played by James Crowell [Babe, The Green Mile] and Julie Walters [Harry Potter, Calendar Girls] pay the bills. However, in her attempt to do so, she falls in love with the charismatic and charming Tom Lefroy, played by James McAvoy [Chronicles of Narnia, Wimbledon], who indoctrinates her in the euphoric intoxication of love, with both of them breaking each others hearts numerous times in the process, all while traveling through some of the most gorgeous scenery in the United Kingdom. While a bit drawn out and tediously paced at times, this process however is where we see the meat of the action in “Becoming Jane� and is where we see the blooming of a beautiful on-screen chemistry between Hathaway and McAvoy that more than makes up for the ups and downs in the plot that may agitate some movie-goers.

However, the biggest problem in the film by far is its predictability. Everyone knows Austen dies alone at the age of 41 and having her come so close to love on so many different occasions with this one man that seems to have been made especially for her literally expends rational belief and patience. Trying perhaps to explain how an unmarried woman could write so passionately about love, “Becoming Jane,� does do a more than venerable job of fictitiously filling in the blanks of the great author’s life and putting her career in content, but falls flat on its Victorian face when trying to put everything together into something that is completely enjoyable. Never feeling as natural as the solid performances of Hathaway, McAvoy, Cromwell and Walters, “Becoming Jane� forces the viewer to suspend their belief in a setting that is realistic and vivid as can be, proving that great on-screen chemistry and beautiful cinematography can never make up for a mediocre script.

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Posted aug 31, 2007 12:36 am pt

• [+] USA Today
  
  88
  If one were to fuse the literary sensibility of Jane Austen with the fanciful imaginative license of "Shakespeare in Love," what would emerge would likely be the charming tale Becoming Jane.

  by Claudia Puig | Read Full Review »
• [+] Variety
  
  80
  An ersatz "Pride and Prejudice" in all but name, Becoming Jane is a finely tooled Brit-lit costumer that, like Anne Hathaway's flawless accent as the young Austen, lacks only that final convincing 5%.

  by Derek Elley | Read Full Review »
• [+] Entertainment Weekly
  
  75
  Becoming Jane has a burnished feminine sadness, and the director, Julian Jarrold, gives it a creamy-dark visual flow.

  by Owen Gleiberman | Read Full Review »
• [+] New York Post
  
  75
  Instead of trying to make Austen's life entertaining by pretending it was just like her work - as in the dull recent French movie "Molière" - Becoming Jane has a more astute appreciation of how Austen, or any fiction writer, works. There's a bit of stealing from life, lots of exaggeration, some wish fulfillment, mix-and-match character assembly.

  by Kyle Smith | Read Full Review »
• [+] Boston Globe
  
  75
  Anne Hathaway's Jane is headstrong and clever, balanced and true.

  by Ty Burr | Read Full Review »
• [+] Chicago Sun-Times
  
  75
  The way all of this plays out is acted warmly by the principals, and Eigil Bryld's photography (of Ireland) makes England look breathtakingly green and inviting. The director, Julian Jarrold ("Kinky Boots" and the TV version of "White Teeth") is comfortable with the material, and it is comfortable with him.

  by Roger Ebert | Read Full Review »
• [+] Premiere
  
  75
  Hathaway's proven charms work magic here.

  by Deborah Day | Read Full Review »
• [+] Film Threat
  
  70
  Hathaway's exuberance and dramatic range are fitting for this portrayal of the celebrated literary figure.

  by Stina Chyn | Read Full Review »
• [+] Portland Oregonian
  
  67
  But if the notion that Austen was more reactive than creative in her writing is troubling, so is the idea that she needed Lefroy to make her into a great writer. "Experience is vital," he tells her. We should be glad this guy never got his paws on Emily Dickinson.

  by Marc Mohan | Read Full Review »
• [+] Seattle Post-Intelligencer
  
  67
  It's an enjoyable period romance. Yet, ultimately, the unique magic of Austen so beautifully caught in 1996's "Emma" is missing.

  by William Arnold | Read Full Review »
• [+] Christian Science Monitor
  
  67
  It's movie-making as match-making.

  by Peter Rainer | Read Full Review »
• [+] ReelViews
  
  63
  There are enough similarities between the movie and "Pride and Prejudice" that one could be forgiven thinking this screenplay is Austen lite.

  by James Berardinelli | Read Full Review »
• [+] TV Guide
  
  63
  Jane Austen deserves better than to be subordinated to her own creation, the spirited Lizzy Bennet.

  by Maitland McDonagh | Read Full Review »
• [+] New York Daily News
  
  63
  We can't quite shake the feeling we've seen this all done before, and better.

  by Elizabeth Weitzman | Read Full Review »
• [+] Miami Herald
  
  63
  Where the film goes wrong is in its attempts to cling too firmly to "Pride and Prejudice."

  by Connie Ogle | Read Full Review »