The new film adaptation of Jane Austen’s Persuasion was introduced to me through generally unimpressed reactions to its trailer on social media. There seemed to be an overall idea that the film completely missed the point of the original novel. Since I read the novel about 15 years ago, I can’t really comment on its accuracy. However, I’d like to write down a few thoughts after watching it, influenced in part by comparison to the film adaptation of 1995, which I have watched many times and very much enjoyed in all its melancholic glory.

Note: I’m coming back here after having finished writing this post to say that I started writing this with a positive impression of the 2022 film, but somehow ended up sounding quite critical of it. Please read all the way to the end so that I’m not responsible for giving the wrong impression!

For those who are not familiar with the story, Persuasion tells the story of the reunion of Anne Elliot, the least favoured daughter of a once-well off, now bankrupt family, and Frederick Wentworth, the once-poor, now very successful sailor who she was persuaded not to marry eight years earlier due to his lower social ranking. Although I didn’t know it until recently, this was Jane Austen’s last novel and one that she wrote at a time in her life when she was perhaps feeling, herself, social and emotional implications of life for an older unmarried woman in early 19th Century England. Finding this out added a new dimension to the story for me, although perhaps one that would be more interesting to reflect on with the novel or 1995 film rather than this one for reasons I will now explore.

These two films really could not be more different. While both films focus on Anne and her emotional turmoil coming face-to-face with the man she has never forgotten, this new adaptation is much more explicit about her feelings through the character’s direct dialogue with the audience. We are given access to her thoughts and feelings throughout the film, including some of the more self-pitying and superficial ones. At first, this was a bit of a shock, since the Anne of the older film is very proper and has more of a self-sacrificing quality to her, but perhaps the direct interaction with Anne’s innermost thoughts allowed the (modern) audience to see her as a complete woman with all her frivolous thoughts and internal conflicts. Having said that, I felt that the weakest element of the film, and one that kept coming back, was the two-dimensional nature of Anne Elliot’s personality and life. So while we perhaps got a more intimate view of her character, it turned out there wasn’t all that much to see. Her whole existence seems to revolve around this love that she gave up and she didn’t really have any other interests or purpose in her life. I never felt this with the older film; that film is much more subtle, showing that Anne is living her life as fully as her circumstances allow, while quietly carrying around the grief of the love she allowed herself to be convinced to let go and can’t quite forget.

The 2022 adaptation brings modern Western sensibilities and language into its interpretation and portrayal of the 1817 novel. This is shown through the multiracial cast, the use of present-day phrases (“he’s a 10” and “my ex”, which I will come to shortly) and the 21st-Century-cynical tone of the film. Before watching the film, I saw somebody on Twitter comment disparagingly on the use of the phrase “my ex” and what Jane Austen would think. At the time I didn’t put too much thought into it, but now that I have seen the film, I think it’s a good example of the approach this film has taken and how it changes the core message. The concept of “exes” is one that is very particular to modern Western dating culture where people have relationships that they may or may not fully invest in, but that rarely start with the intention of a lifelong commitment. This leads to the likelihood of one person having at least a few “exes”, making the word and situation quite common and not too shocking. To take such a phrase and use it in the context of courting in the early 19th Century, when a relationship was expected to lead to marriage and anything else was abnormal, is to drag all the flippancy of modern dating relationships in along with it. So what once was the tragic story of a woman whose lack of confidence in her own judgement and regretted submission to unjust social expectations led to her losing what she knew deep down was right for her becomes the story of a girl with not much else going on who can’t get over that guy she liked (but maybe can if that other cute guy keeps saying funny things). Another modern addition is the inclination to talk about everything explicitly: the amount of times through the film when Anne and Frederick talk about their past relationship and feelings make it almost feel like they are talking about the weather or what they had for dinner. This, along with the occasional glib and cynical comments Anne makes to the audience, means the film loses a lot of the gravity that I found so impactful in the 1995 version.

In my mind, Persuasion is a story of living with the quiet but tortuous regret that comes with betraying yourself and your values, as well as a portrayal of the status of unmarried, slightly older women in England at that time and the usual family dynamics and frivolities of the rich and pretending-to-be rich in society that Jane Austen liked to explore. The 2022 version has none of the depth that I always experienced watching the 1995 film and this is most obvious in [sort of spoiler alert – skip to the next sentence] the Letter scene, which was the climax of years of silent suffering and always had me holding my breath but which, in this version, was so meaningless that it almost needn’t have happened. With all that being said, if you enjoy the silly families and self-involved characters that are a staple of Austen adaptations, you will likely enjoy this; I know I laughed more than once. As a standalone film, I think it’s quite enjoyable and I would generally recommend it for those who want to indulge in a couple of hours of mostly clean period drama fun.

“Ever since Louisa’s accident, life just seems so fragile and fleeting. It’s made me realise how important it is to spend time away from one’s children.” Mary Elliot