Beautiful, Beautiful, and Again Beautiful; So There, Austen Purists

Rating: 9/10 (20 March 2007)

I watched this movie because another IMDb poster told me it was "horrible." I didn't expect to like it.
I loved it.
This "Pride and Prejudice" is beautiful, beautiful, and, again, beautiful. Colors are as artfully juxtaposed as in a formal painting. Shots are composed so beautifully I wanted to freeze frame at least a dozen times.
The beauty here is not static. It extends to the treatment of the material. This is the third or fourth "Pride and Prejudice" I've seen, and this is the first one in which Darcy came across as a human life form, rather than an insect trapped in a human body. He's no less hidebound than in other versions; it's just that MacFadyen managed to convey to me that there was a man in there, somewhere.
No, I didn't fall in love with Colin Firth as Darcy. Further, I find Austen's writing cold, dry, and snotty. So shoot me.
The negative reviews here claim that this adaptation is not true to Austen's style. Good, I say.
Negative reviews object to the Bennets living in an agricultural setting. I gotta tell ya -- it did not ruin my digestion to see a pig's hindquarters in an adaptation of an Austen work.
Further, I'm one of those people who, when watching movies like this, always thinks, "Why should I care about the fates of these upper class twits? Why are these people's servants given less attention than their picturesque stock animals?" I was moved by Elizabeth's and Darcy's plight as depicted in this adaptation because I was so won over by the artistry of the film-making. It seduced me, in a good way, to caring about people I normally laugh at and dismiss, or wish to see overthrown in a revolution.
I loved the piano soundtrack. I usually don't take note of the soundtrack until I've seen a movie a couple of times, but in exceptional cases it will make itself known to me, in a good way. it did here. The music enhanced the experience for me. I felt tender, sweet, open to the experience.
I'm not an Austen fan. I'm not an Anglophile. I'm a movie fan. I love good movies. And this was a good movie. I think that the Austen purists who gave this movie one-star reviews are riding their high horses so hard that they missed what could have otherwise been a beautiful experience. Wake up and smell the heather, people.