Product: Becoming Jane [Blu-ray] (2007)
Rating: 3.0
I enjoyed it but...
As an avid Jane Austen fan, I'm always ready to see a new Austen adaptation. This one intrigued me because it's the first Austen biopic I can recall. I enjoyed it, but it does tend to engage in a lot of speculative fantasizing about Austen's life and loves. However, if you're willing to take it as an "Austen-inspired" romance, I think it's entertaining.For me James McAvoy's performance is really what drives this movie and makes it worth watching. His performance is assured, charming, boyish, sexy, and intelligent. The other enjoyable feature of the movie is all of the reliable English actors that populate the film in secondary roles. Maggie Smith and the late Ian Richardson turn in their usual impeccable performances.For me the disappointment in this movie is Anne Hathaway's (a) casting, and (b) performance. While her chemistry with McAvoy was undeniable, ultimately there was just no way I felt the girl on the screen was capable of brilliance...something essential for anyone playing Austen. (In fairness, that's partly a fault of the script.) Hathaway's English accent is passable most of the time, but there were times she was so soft spoken, I had to turn the volume way up to hear her. She would have been well served to take a course in elocution and diction.