An ode to Pride and Prejudice

Why the 95 miniseries outclasses the 2005 movie

Back in 2005, when promoting her role as Elizabeth Bennet in Joe Wright’s version of Pride and Prejudice, Kiera Knightley delivered the sentence that would forever cleave Pride and Prejudice fans in two:

“Only snobby fans of the ’95 version won’t like it.”

Like Mentos in Coke, like Mt St Helen’s seconds before the eruption, like the meteor as it wiped out the dinosaurs, the wrath of hard-core snobby Pride and Prejudice fans exploded. To be fair, said hard-core fans had been threatening to explode ever since they heard that anyone would be foolish enough to attempt another retelling of Pride and Prejudice after the definitive masterpiece 1995 miniseries.

This is because, to the 1995 fans, their beloved miniseries is not a movie; it is an experience. It is a six-hour escape into the lives of the Bennets, a close-up examination of how Mr Bennet struggles to not roll his eyes at his wife, ample opportunity to stare at Colin Firth’s tortured face, and a close study of Jane Austen’s trademark humour. The 1995 Mrs Bennet radiates lunacy; Mr Collins reeks obsequiousness; Mrs Bingley looks down upon her nose with breath-taking snootiness, and Lady Catherine’s condescension is a masterclass in tone-deaf upper-class snobbery. To the 1995 fans, their miniseries is Pride and Prejudice as envisioned by Jane Austen; the 2005 version is Pride and Prejudice written by the Bronte sisters. With only two hours allotted to tell a tale that should take at least three times that amount, Joe Wright’s 2005 version has no choice but boil the story down to the bare bones, eliminate all traces of Jane Austen’s trademark humour, and hope that Kiera Knightley’s collarbones will make up for it.

Having said that, Joe did not rely completely on Kiera’s collarbones. He also took threw in a stirring full-size string orchestra, let Kiera wear her hair down, took sweeping shots of the English countryside, and got lucky when a flock of birds took off at just the right moment when Mr Darcy proposes to Elizabeth. Not only that, he made a memorable reference to boiled potatoes. If memes can be counted as evidence, 2005 Mr Collins compliments Mrs Bennet’s ‘excellent boiled potatoes’, which, if social media can be believed, reduces 2005 fans to fits of hysterical mirth. However, Jane Austen devotes very little of her word count to potatoes, and makes no mention at all of boiled ones during Mr Collins’ stay.

Of course, it would be hypocritical to complain about producers going rogue and inventing scenes purely for cinematic entertainment when 1995 Mr Darcy takes a dive into a lake on the grounds outside Pemberley. Public diving is not behaviour that Book Darcy engages in, but it is also not something Colin Firth has ever, in his life, been berated for.

It would be difficult to mention anyone berating anything without bringing up Lady Catherine de Bourgh, queen of condescending those in her orbit with her opinions. Lady Catherine, the original battle-axe of the 1800s, makes it her life’s mission to mould people to do her bidding. Her other mission is to ensure that the shades of Pemberley remain unpolluted. In the 2005 version, she does this in the middle of the night and calmly asks Elizabeth in the candlelight if the shades of Permberley are to be thus polluted. This is the very reverse of Movie Dumbledore shouting at Harry if he put his name in the goblet of fire. (Book Dumbledore asks this question calmly, as all book fans are aware.) Surely, Lady Catherine, racked with displeasure as she is, would wail to the heavens, “Are the SHADES of PEMBERLEY to be THUS POLLUTED?” Surely she would arrive in the daytime, so she can muse bitterly about how the windows at Longbourne face full west?

It is not only 2005 Lady Catherine who lacks conviction, but also 2005 Charlotte Lucas, who is paralysed with the fear that she is twenty-seven years old, has no prospects, and is a burden to her parents. The 1995 Charlotte would sigh, inwardly do a giant eye roll and sit her down and set her straight; she would show her how to calculatedly steal Mr Collins away, and once she has successfully trapped him, she would give lessons on how to send him away to the garden all day so she can live out the rest of her days in peace.

In the balance of fairness, let us explore what the 2005 version gets right. It gets the names of the characters right. It is set in England. It is in English. But anything that casts Judi Dench and manages to under-use her deserves to be crucified online, which is what millions of 1995 fans around the world tirelessly do to this day.