FilmSnobReviews

Title: Persuasion
MPAA Rating: PG
Director: Carrie Cracknell
Starring: Dakota Johnson, Henry Golding, Richard E. Grant
Runtime: 1 hr 48 mins

What It Is: Based on the Jane Austen novel of the same name we follow young Anne Elliott (Johnson) who eight years previously was persuaded not to marry a dashing young man she was infatuated with. Now they’ve met again and the dashing young man, Fredrick Wentworth (Golding) has reappeared back in her life. This comes as a sudden change to her once snobby lifestyle begins to occur. A change that’ll shift her sister and fathers entire perspective.

What We Think: I really struggled to get through this one. First and foremost I’m not really in to period pieces of this sort. It does not help that the entire film is a dreadful, dreadful bore. Dakota Johnson is so damned charismatic and quite frankly pulls the whole thing together. Without her pristine performance here, so witty and charming, there would be a bare cupboard. Carrie Cracknell isn’t lighting the world on fire with the direction here and it mostly just looks like a modern film. Nothing worth writing home about, but likewise nothing worthy of your attention. SOMETIMES these sorts of period pieces can standout and really give us a time and place. This doesn’t have the gusto to quite get there.

Our Grade: D+, A sadly disappointing rendition for the Austen fans out there and one that won’t hold a candle to the modern versions of Sense and Sensibility or Pride and Prejudice. It seems that somewhere along the way this adaptation lost the spirit of Austen’s work. With that it loses it’s goodwill with me and probably most other audiences as well. Netflix is really good at screwing up easy layups for a quick buck. This might JUST be that exact scenario once again playing out.