Mansfield Park

This seems like a film made with Jane Austen kind of elements but doesn't relate at all to the 'Mansfield Park' novel that Jane Austen wrote. It has no idea what the novel is about and I think that if you are adapting a book for the screen that it should be at least faithful to the spirit of the book. And that certainly means not casting Billie Piper as Fanny Price. Whoever thought of that one deserves a raspberry. I'm sure I was laughing in the wrong places.

I watched it expecting it to get better but sank lower and lower in my seat. One of Austen's more profound novels had been turned into flavourless and unrewarding entertainment (if that is even the word). TV and film producers for ages have been underestimating the general audience and this Austen travesty is another slap in the face. It is a great shame that the quality of British television plummets year after year.

Well, this latest version of Mansfield Park seemed to try and take the edginess of the 1999 theatrical version (outright copied some of the ideas from it in fact), but tone things down a bit to bring it more in line with the original story. Unfortunately, the result is a rather lackluster, and schizophrenic, production. And, as with all the other versions of Mansfield Park out there, the character of Fanny Price is no where to be found. Instead there is a strangely child-like, bleached-blond woman running around who never really fully develops as a character. At least in the 1999 movie the character they call "Fanny Price" is firmly established as rebellious tomboy who is too clever for her own good. This "Fanny Price" is a complete enigma. Someday, I would really like to see a dramatization of Mansfield Park that actually includes a depiction of the character of Fanny as she was written by Jane Austen. A sweet, kind, compassionate girl with a timid personality and frail constitution. She is reserved in manner and painfully honest, but also strong in her convictions, unfailingly loyal, extremely intelligent, and remarkably astute. A bit of a late bloomer, it is not until her eighteenth year that she finally begins to make the transition from awkward adolescent to self-possessed young woman. And she wants nothing more in life than to be of some real use to those she loves most. It's a wonderfully complex character that I look forward to one day seeing faithfully portrayed.

Fanny Price (Billie Piper) was sent to live with her aunts in Mansfield Park at the age of 10. Her aunt Mrs. Norris gets tired of her. Her other aunt Lady Bertram and her wealthy husband Sir Thomas Bertram have four children, Tom (James D'Arcy), Edmund (Blake Ritson), Maria (Michelle Ryan), and Julia (Catherine Steadman). All of them treat Fanny as inferior except Edmund. She falls in love with his kindness. Sir Thomas has to attend to business in the West Indies. Tom returns as a degenerate gambler. Edmund is left as the head of the family. Maria is engaged and plans to marry after her father's return. The family is turned upside down with the arrival of their neighbors siblings Mary (Hayley Atwell) and Henry Crawford (Joseph Beattie).

Billie Piper is a very modern personality and doesn't fit the Fanny character. She's itching to break out of her restrained role. The production is strictly TV level. This is a problematic presentation of a classic. These are solid actors but they are wasted. It's been done much better and there is no need for this.

Was this sponsored by Wash and go? Was the hair stylist on strike? What a mess! Would well-bred young ladies of those days be seen in public with hair like Billie Piper's? Casting Ms Piper was a big, big, big error. She is undeniably attractive to look at, but, after Dr Who, the natural place for her was EastEnders, not in a Jane Austen adaptation. Her looks and demeanour are completely out of place.

The ITV website shows the makers of the film saying (this is the gist) that Fanny Price is a boring character, but that they fixed that by bringing in Billie Piper. If they had so little sympathy or understanding for Jane Austen's original work, why did they bother adapting it? (Were these the same people who gave us 'Marple'? The same blinkered, tied-to-the-zeitgeist mentality was at work there too).

This version is rather boring. It also seems to be a very low-budget one, bound to the one setting. The so-called picnic (a few people standing around on the lawn of the house) is an unbelievably feeble scene.

But it is at least vastly better than the 1999 version.

This is a really disappointing version of a clever book, with inappropriate characterisations and appalling acting from its lead actress. As Fanny Price, Billie Piper is just wrong in every respect - too modern, too flirtatious, and too aware of her station.

However there are some compensations, even if the characters are portrayed with little reference to the original book - Douglas Hodge, Jemma Redgrave, and Maggie O'Neill are pretty good, while Blake Ritson has a decent stab at the role of Edmund.

It just doesn't feel right or have the correct sense of period. It's a bit without character, and a missed opportunity.