The New 'Sense and Sensibility' Is in Theaters. Austen's Lesson on Self-Control Still Holds.
Daisy Edgar-Jones and Esmé Creed-Miles star in a new 'Sense and Sensibility.' What families should know, and why Elinor Dashwood is still the hero.
In a weekend crowded with a video-game brawler, a whale thriller and a three-hour con-artist documentary, Hollywood also offered something quieter: two sisters, a cottage in Devon and a lesson in self-control written more than 200 years ago.
The new "Sense and Sensibility," directed by Georgia Oakley from a script by Diana Reid, opened in wide release Friday. It is rated PG and runs 2 hours and 11 minutes, according to the Los Angeles Times. Daisy Edgar-Jones plays Elinor Dashwood, the sensible elder sister, and Esmé Creed-Miles plays the passionate Marianne. George MacKay, Frank Dillane, Herbert Nordrum, Fiona Shaw and Caitríona Balfe round out the cast.
How it is doing
The Focus Features release was projected to take in about $6.7 million over its opening weekend from 2,545 theaters, placing fifth, Deadline reported Saturday. "Street Fighter" led with an expected $31 million.
Critics have been generally warm. The Times' Glenn Whipp called it "a fresh, free-limbed adaptation that holds its own against others," and wrote that the real love story is "the one between the sisters. And it is deeply felt." He praised Edgar-Jones for making "us feel the yearning beneath Elinor's calm reserve."
Variety's Beatrice Loayza was cooler, calling it "a solid undertaking" but noting that "a seriousness of tone" strips away some of Austen's wit. Both critics measured it against Ang Lee's 1995 version, which Loayza called "the Platonic ideal of the Jane Austen adaptation."
A note for parents: the Times lists the PG rating as being "for some thematic elements, partial nudity and brief violence." Families should check before taking younger children.
A story about self-command
The plot will be familiar to many readers. After their father dies, Mrs. Dashwood and her daughters lose their estate to a half-brother and his greedy wife and move to a modest cottage in Devon. Marianne falls hard for the charming Willoughby, a man the Times rightly calls a "cad." Elinor quietly loves the shy Edward and hides her heartbreak when she learns he is promised to another woman.
Modern audiences often read the story as a contest between head and heart, with the heart as the hero. Austen was wiser than that. Marianne's open-hearted passion is lovely, but it nearly ruins her. She trusts her feelings, and her feelings trust the wrong man. Elinor feels just as deeply. The difference is that she governs what she feels, keeps her word and thinks of others before herself.
That is not coldness. It is what the Bible calls self-control, and it is listed as fruit of the Spirit, right alongside love and joy (Galatians 5:22-23). "He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city" (Proverbs 16:32).
Our culture tells young people to follow their hearts. Scripture is more honest: "The heart is deceitful above all things" (Jeremiah 17:9). Feelings are real, and God gave them to us. But they make terrible masters. Willoughby follows his own desires and leaves wreckage behind him. Elinor bears her sorrow patiently, and in the end she is not the one who is ruined.
Why Austen keeps coming back
Whipp notes that Austen "will never go out of style because we're not going to reach a point when we stop worrying about money, status and the gobsmacking difficulty of telling someone you love them." He is right, and there is another reason. Austen's novels assume that character matters, that promises bind, that a man who toys with a woman's affections has done real wrong, and that patience and honesty are worth more than charm.
Those are not old-fashioned values. They are true ones. Christian families looking for something to watch together have learned to watch new adaptations of beloved books closely, and that is wise here too. Whatever this version gets right or wrong, the story underneath it still teaches what it always has: the person who rules his own spirit is stronger than the one who is ruled by it.
And if the film sends a few teenagers back to the novel itself, so much the better.
