Posts Tagged Anne Hathaway

Women’s History Month: Biopics about Women Writers

Posted by Amy Steele in DVD, Film, Women/ feminism on March 8, 2013

black butterflies

Black Butterflies [2011]
Director: Paula van der Oest
Starring: Carice van Houten, Liam Cunningham, Rutger Hauer
–about the volatile life of South African poet Ingrid Jonker

sylvia

Sylvia [2003]
Starring: Gwyneth Paltrow, Daniel Craig
Director: Christine Jeffs
–focuses on relationship between poets Sylvia Plath and Ted Hughes

IRIS

Iris [2001]
Starring: Judi Densch, Jim Broadbent, Kate Winslet
Director: Richard Eyre
–lifelong romance between novelist Iris Murdoch and her husband John Bayley from their days as students through her battle with Alzheimer’s disease

becoming jane

Becoming Jane [2007]
Starring: Anne Hathaway
Director: Julian Jarrold
–pre-fame Jane Austen and her romance with a young Irishman

miss potter

Miss Potter [2006]
Starring: Renee Zellweger, Ewan McGregor, Emily Watson
Director: Chris Noonan
–Beatrix Potter, the author of the beloved and best-selling children’s book, “The Tale of Peter Rabbit”

the-children-of-the-century-

The Children of the Century [1999]
Starring: Juliette Binoche, Benoit Magimel
Director: Diane Kurys
–love affair between novelist George Sand and author Alfred de Musset

mrs parker

Mrs. Parker and the Viscous Circle [1994]
Starring: Jennifer Jason Leigh, Cambell Scott, Peter Gallagher
Director: Alan Rudolph
–Dorothy Parker and her heyday with the Algonquin Round Table circle of friends

impromtu

Impromptu [1991]
Starring: Judy Davis, Hugh Grant, Mandy Patinkin
Director: James Lapine
–writer George Sand pursues pianist/composer Frederic Chopin in 1830s France

angel at my table

An Angel at My Table [1990]
Starring: Kerry Fox, Alexia Keogh, Karen Fergusson
Director: Jane Campion
–Janet Frame grows up with lots of brothers and sisters in a poor family in 1920s and 1930s New Zealand. She always feels different from others. After getting education as a teacher, she’s sent to a mental institution for eight years. She gains success when she begins writing novels.

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DVD review: Becoming Jane

Posted by Amy Steele in DVD on May 12, 2008

Becoming Jane_posterLove, love this distinctive fantasy about what Jane Austen’s life may have been like. In the fictionalized biopic about a young Jane Austen, Becoming Jane imagines what influenced her charming, insightful, witty feminist writings. Who influenced the characters in her book? How could she imagine heartache, the pressures of making a good marriage and the financial woes that unfortunately guided many decisions in women’s lives in the 19th century, without the experiences herself.

A writer, like me, cherishes this type of film. It shows the tedium of writing, along with the creativity and sparks. For this alone, Becoming Jane, is a wonderful literary film. Writing seems such an independent and fabulous profession but its reality looks bleaker in the light of day. Loneliness, isolation and repetition keep every writer company at some point. Jane seems to write herself into her novels and why not? Every writer dreams of living within the pages of a well-crafted, thoughtful book.

As Jane, Anne Hathaway [The Devil Wears Prada] is equal parts independent, outspoken and hopeless romantic. She has intense, expressive eyes and really pushes herself in this role. As her love interest, Tom Lefroy, James McAvoy [the current go-to art film heartthrob] combines the character’s mischevious side with an earnest one. He loves Jane but she knows that neither of them can go through with it. Jane yearns for a room of her own and to “live by her pen” even more [gasp!] than to have a real love in her life. That’s just the most practical thing for this willful, talented woman. As the world knows, she never married but wrote six successful novels including Pride and Prejudice, Sense and Sensibility and Emma. All have been made into films several times over.

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