Northanger Abbey

Ok, I'll say it first. What the hell was that? I always wondered why this one BBC adaptation wasn't sold in the set with the other five, now I know. Poor dear Jane must be spinning (or doing cartwheels?) in her grave! I hardly know where to begin. I guess I'll start with what bothered me the most, although it had nothing to do with the plot. What was with the costumes, hair and makeup? I could barely stand to look at some of these people. I thought the old BBC Persuasion set the standard for the Big-Hair Look, but this left it in the dust, and it was sticking out in the oddest places...The makeup was appalling, the Dowager Whomever looked like someone had had at her with a paint-by-numbers kit! As to the characters, I was truly offended by the way John Thorpe was portrayed. He was openly leering at Catherine! I expected him to smack his lips at any moment, disgusting! Ok, I'll let someone else take over for now, but I shall return! I have only just begun to dish!

I am half way through the novel and planned on watching my tape tonight. But after your comment, I think I will simply finish reading tonight. I found Thorpe to be incredibly annoying already; your description makes him sound like some of my worst dates!

Lynn -- you know what Jane Austen said: "John Thorpe... was a stout young man of middling height, who, with a plain face and ungraceful form, seemed fearful of being too handsome unless he wore the dress of a groom, and too much like a gentleman unless he were easy where he ought to be civil, and impudent where he might be allowed to be easy." [...] "...All the rest of his conversation, or rather talk, began and ended with himself and his own concerns. [...] Little as Catherine was in the habit of judging for herself, and unfixed as were her general notions of what men ought to be, she could not entirely repress a doubt, while she bore with the effusions of his endless conceit, of his being altogether completely agreeable. It was a bold surmise, for he was Isabella's brother; and she had been assured by James that his manners would recommend him to all her sex; but in spite of this, the extreme weariness of his company, which crept over her before they had been out an hour, and which continued unceasingly to increase till they stopped in Pulteney Street again, induced her, in some small degree, to resist such high authority, and to distrust his powers of giving universal pleasure."

I read the novel for the first time two weeks ago and I enjoyed it very much. I didn't know that it was going to be shown on TV early this morning, so I rented the video last week. Talk about different interpretations. It was, ..well.., I am having a hard time to find the words to describe it, so I'll be polite and say, not the way I envisioned it at all. What a pity! And so unfortunate too. It could have been so entertaining. This was plain hard to watch. Since Cheryl and Lynn started talking about Thorpe, let me start from there also. Thorpe reminded me of one of those guys who are always around you when you are interested in somebody else (brought up some memories ;)). As much as I found him annoying, I found the situations created because of him very humorous (in the book of course). I also thought that his presence increased Catherine's anticipation and impatience to be with Mr. Tilney. And that was cute. I agree with Cheryl that he was portrayed to be way too disgusting in the movie. So disgusting that I can't imagine any humour associated with a character like that. What a disappointment! But worst of all, the dialogues and scenes I enjoyed the most in the novel were all either left out or misinterpreted. All of them! :( Megan

Boy do I agree! I just watched the film this week, and I was like, WHAT WAS THAT! One question however, is Peter Firth (who played Mr. Tilney) related to Colin Firth? curious

No, Peter Firth and Colin Firth are not related. Colin does have an actor brother by the name of Jonathan, however. (I believe he has a sister as well, but I don't know her name.)

I haven't seen this for ages, but I didn't have Cheryl's violent reaction. I have to say -- when the actor who plays Henry (forgive me if I'm misremembering; haven't read the novel in 15 years) goes back for Catherine and finds her in the woods and smacks her one - baby, I'm down with that!

Amy2 -- that is a nice scene, albeit a little melodramatic. I have given up the idea that an adaptation is going to be faithful to the book, although I didn't as much humor from this adaptation as I would have hoped for.

I had to find my tape of this (yes, I own all the Austen adaptations, I think, except P&P0). I skimmed through most of it. Now I remember that something about the ending bothered me when I watched it before -- it is filmed as though it is another fantasy, though not a Gothic Romantic fantasy. Did any of the major players besides Peter Firth and Robert Hardy do film/tv work that we would know in the US? I thought I recognized the actor who played Henry's brother, but the name is not familiar.

It has been almost a year since I saw this one, but I remember only too well my reaction to it. Isn't it amazing that you could get such an awful movie out of a JA novel?! I mean P&P0 was not good, but if you had never read the book, you might still be entertained. With this, however, I don't think you would even know what was going ON if you hadn't read the book!! And even having read the book, you still don't know what is going on!! I can't remember the particulars of the movie itself, and I'm not ure if I can bring myself to watch it again. There was no humor in it at all, and NA is SO funny!

There is one very good thing about this movie. It is the "Quirky" adaptation tha inspired Andrew Davies and Sue Birtwhistle to do "Pride and Prejudice an d to make it look like a fresh,lively story about real people" So, without this adaptation, we wouldn't be together, right? (and CF might not havebeen such an inspiration to us!) Seriously, though I watch my copy for Robert Hardy, Googie Withers and Peter Firth, there are some bits of the adaptation I enjoy- Catherine in the Apple Tree, and the silly "taking the waters" scenes

Re the waters scenes: What are those plates? Is it food? Is it like having a cocktail at a swim-up bar?

If a group of 8th graders wrote and produced an adaption of a JA novel, I would probably enjoy it. I got up early Friday morning, turned on the VCR and fell asleep at halftime. Maybe sometime this weekend, I will get the watch the movie from start to finish. Henry's first scene was so 'off center" that I thought the writers had given his opening lines to a different character, but he improved in the scenes that included Elinor. The Thorpes were just what they should be - brash and vulgar. Mr. and Mrs. Allen were fine. The fantasy sequences were acceptable to show us Catherine's state of mine. The carriage scenes looked ok. Maybe, after I see the rest of the movie, I will see something to dislike!

Maybe Lynn hit on why I disliked this so much. I enjoy NA, it's not my favorite JA, but it has several very funny sequences and LOL spots. I didn't laugh once during this production. I grimaced, I gaped, I smirked, I snickered, I snorted, I groaned, I rolled my eyes, but I never laughed out loud. The closest I came was during one of the fantasy sequences when the old lady was sewing her fingers together and that was more of a "I can't believe they're doing that!" than alaugh. "Quirky", indeed!

Now I remember that Bath scene, where everyone is wearing a formal hat and a buttoned-up bathing costume, not to mention their dragging a tray of goodies around! Henry or someone - is this historically accurate? Or just another "quirky" touch?

Wow -- where to start here...there is so much to comment on: First of all I taped it and I will probably watch it again (and even more than twice). I admit it, I am a hopeless JA junkie, and will satisfy myself with the "cheep drugs" (such as this bad production) as well as the "expensive drugs" (such as the very well done productions) The actress who played Catherine, I thought quite good. She seemed to portray with her eyes the essence of the character...seeing something right in front of her but so naive, that she just doesn't get it. The rest of the cast, ummm, how can I put this delicately, PeeEww!!! I did not like the costuming -- It was just too much...I much prefer the simplicity of P&P2 or Persuassion. As far as the adaption itself, I thought just OK -- Although what I simply cannot forgive was leaving out what I thought the most delightful scene in the whole book -- The conversation between Henry & Catherine in the carriage on the way to NA. In fact, I remember while reading the book, quite often I would have to exclaim right out loud "delightful!". I believe that the "movie makers" here lost this point...they seemed (especially with the music thoughout) to try to concentrate on the "Gothic" and not he perception of the young girl perceiving the "Gothic".

Wow -- where to start here...there is so much to comment on: First of all I taped it and I will probably watch it again (and even more than twice). I admit it, I am a hopeless JA junkie, and will satisfy myself with the "cheep drugs" (such as this bad production) as well as the "expensive drugs" (such as the very well done productions) The actress who played Catherine, I thought quite good. She seemed to portray with her eyes the essence of the character...seeing something right in front of her but so naive, that she just doesn't get it. The rest of the cast, ummm, how can I put this delicately, PeeEww!!! I did not like the costuming -- It was just too much...I much prefer the simplicity of P&P2 or Persuassion. As far as the adaption itself, I thought just OK -- Although what I simply cannot forgive was leaving out what I thought the most delightful scene in the whole book -- The conversation between Henry & Catherine in the carriage on the way to NA. In fact, I remember while reading the book, quite often I would have to exclaim right out loud "delightful!". I believe that the "movie makers" here lost this point...they seemed (especially with the music thoughout) to try to concentrate on the "Gothic" and not he perception of the young girl perceiving the "Gothic".

I did not post this twice!!!!!!

The costumes,hair, and make-up reminded me of the "Restoration" era. a gothic novel-Of a style of fiction that emphasizes the grotesque and mysterious. ] I believe that the "movie makers" here lost this point...they seemed (especially with the music thoughout) to try to concentrate on the "Gothic" and not the perception of the young girl perceiving the "Gothic". I agree Candace. Who said this was a gothic novel? While I was reading I thought it was more a comedy and about a young girls "wild" imagination. Compared to the book the movie was all wrong.

Ok, the music...did it remind anyone else of the horrendously insipid music they use in soft-core porn movies? ;-) (never mind how I know!)

Oh, Cheryl, maybe you should hie yourself to confession? ;-)

soft-core porn - which I know I would love but do not know how to find - or how to recognize. Can someone steer a middle-class, middle-age, small-town mother in the right direction?

I did not post that!!!!!!!

Cheryl - ROTFLOL!! I kept trying to put my finger on where have I heard bad music like this before. It's that bad filler music that is trying to portray so type of depth or tension. It accompanies bad "B" movies as well. Though I haven't read NA yet I kept thinking what were these people thinking. It didn't have JA's witty humor. So much was over the top such as John Thropes character. But as Caroline has reminded us, good things can happen from bad movies. This "quirky" adaptation inspired P&P2; amazing isn't it;-)

Katy dearest, one does not have to go looking for soft-core porn...I have certainly never gone looking for it, it simply appears on your TV as you are channel surfing through HBO or Showtime...suddenly there are these naked bodies and this awful music and it's like a car crash, you can't avert your eyes...

- oh no. that is why we discontinued HBO and Showtime - fav. teen is the only one who can stay up taht late!!

well, there you go! ;-)

When she goes off to college!!!

"it simply appears on your TV as you are channel surfing through HBO" Such as Playmaker, perhaps?

]Such as Playmaker, perhaps? ______ Oh, but Ann, Playmakers has that one redeeming feature that makes it all worthwhile...;-P"

I do believe that the credits were inaccurate...I am sure that the person who portrayed the General's confidant was really played by Keith Richard of the Rolling Stones, or was it Stephen Tyler of Aerosmith? Can someone explain the scene to me in which the little boy takes Catherine outside and does cartwheels? What was that? I certainly didn't get it.

AG, Candace!

I finished the tape today. I enjoyed it. no, it would not win any fans for the story or for JA, but I enjoyed it anyway. I liked the lawn scenes at the parsonage at the end. I though the general was spot on. but as I admitted earlier in this thread, I would enjoy any JA adaption. (but I hope no one messes with lady catherine again like P&P0 did!)

Cheryl : What was with the costumes, hair and makeup? As Henry Tilney mentions beheadings by guillotine and Jacobin partisanerie, this was then rather set around 1794-95. Time of the Directory Government in France and a Royal Proclamation against public meetings in England. If set then, it's in accordance with the times in the very early part of the Regency http://humanitas.ucsb.edu/projects/pack/rom-chrono/chrono5a.htm Kathleen : Did any of the major players besides Peter Firth and Robert Hardy do film/tv work Candace : he person who portrayed the General's confidant was really played by Keith Richard of the Rolling Stones, or was it Stephen Tyler of Aerosmith? Speachless, ROTFLOL haven't laugh like this in a long time !!! also : Can someone explain the scene to me in which the little boy takes Catherine outside and does cartwheels? What was that? I certainly didn't get it. Neither did I...

The hat/hair thing that really intrigued/confused me was the long curls coming out of some slits in the hat fabric? I know I missed some of the actors' lines just trying to figure it out.

Just rewatched NA last night, and am nearly through with re-reading the book. One thing I noticed in re-reading the original is that JA's voice is much more present than in any other book of hers -- she is the ironic narrator from beginning to end, and that gives the whole story its humour! I just love the very beginning where she introduces the Morland family: "Her father was a clergyman, without being neglected or poor, and a very respectable man, though his name was Richard, and he had never been handsome." And about Catherine: "She never could learn or understand anything before she was taught, and sometimes not even then, for she was often inattentive, and occasionally stupid." These humorous bits would have been impossible to put on film, but it does set up the whole story to the point you know you're not meant to take it seriously.! I didn't mind the film - the dream sequences I thought were overdone and when they passed N.A. on the way to Bath it was all wrong - they didn't pass it and the abbey was quite differently described in the book. I thought Catherine, the Allens and the General and even her parents were good in their roles. But I didn't care for Peter Firth at all -- just didn't like his looks, his smirks, his small eyes. John Thorpe, I thought, looked like everybody's idea of a second-hand car salesman and Isabella was uitably stupid. But what was that bathing scene doing there? And WHO was that confidante of the General's?? BTW - during the bathing scene all I could do was giggle and think about a similar scene in "The Advocate"! Maybe there was something to be said for the medieval French lack of inhibitions!! Didn't understand the boy's cartwheel scene at all, nor even the need for the small boy! Well - it wasn't JA or even N.A. as in the book, but I suppose we could call it an amusing diversion!

The book Northanger Abbey seems to be set about 1798-1799, during the same period when Jane Austen was actually working on Susan (the original version of Northanger Abbey -- Catherine Morland was originally named "Susan"). A lot of the gothic novels mentioned by Isabella were first published in 1798 or 1797.

Well, I watched the movie on Friday night and finished the novel over the weekend. I could not match the two - I thought the movie was awful. Everytime I saw John Thorpe, he re-reminded me of Bugger from "Revenge of the Nerds". And the gothic music - this is not a movie I want to see again. Maybe if it was presented more like "Alice in Wonderland", it certainly had that feel about it.

wasn't the general played by the same actor from Sense & Sensibility2? I kept thinking were do I know this voice from.

A while back Caroline nicely lend me her tape and here were my first impressions as given to her then : What can I say... I'm REALLY speechless. First because when I read the novel there were some passages I wasnt sure I comprehended fully but the viewing is not resolving this issue. The first thing is that it's not at all faitfull to the book although I believe it presents some basic concepts and emotions. If you discart any comparison to the book, as a movie by itself it was very enternaining. The music is cheesy but rather hypnotising. It follows you, giving a gothic feel, reminds me of bad rendition of Philip Glass. As a reminder of the punk era prevalent in the 80's,at the time of the filming, here is the Marchioness which/witch is not existant in the novel. Did'nt think much of the actress playing Cath, she acted well but too much in the same vein which is the innocent one from beginning to end, you do 't see any change nor maturity in her, was this what JA intended? to surreal. As for Mr. Firth's portrayal, well, the intent was probably to distinguish a very much accomplish modern man for the time, thus the singing and understanding much more refined compare to the older generation, like is unmannered, unrefined and vulgar father (I can hear Ms Bingley say : "the singing, Louisa, the singing..."). Altough he is not a particularly good looking man, Mr. Firth did'nt leave me cold. It's my first encounter with this actor and he mesmerized me. There is a definite teasing, flirtaciou way in his play, and I found this very becoming. Some aspects of an accomplished man at the time must have seen rather sissyish to a man like his father. Have they played the gothic theme just a tad to much? And what of the romantic scene, especially at the end? Not at all JA, but I enjoyed these very much for the sheer pleasure of romance. After numerous viewing now I'm more indulgent on this movie and of Catherine's portrayal but still enjoy the plain romance in it. Although you have to discart this as any type of JA rendition, like other movies, it grows on you.

You were right about the voices, Lorna. General Tilney and Sir John in S&S2 are played by another favourite of mine Robert Hardy. Remember him as a favourite of Queen Elizabeth I in a British film(1971:Elizabeth R available on video with Glenda Jackson as the queen.) It was not Essex, she called him Robin...I've been to the remainders of his castle in England. No, memory fails.

Dear LornaDoone(nice name by the way, Exmoor's one of my favourite places) Robert Hardy- as in "Middlemarch", "All Creatures Great and Small" several "Miss Marples" and just about every other Brit Costume Classic of the last two decades, is the General.

Did you all notice the peacocks on Catherine's arrival at the abbey? Remember that whole debate? I could not find it in the old board archives. Now, what is the story about this became the inspiration for P&P2? I don't understand.

Amy- I quoted from "The Making OF P&P", Introduction, first paragraph, by Sue Birtwhistle. Apparently, she and Andrew Davies were watching this production together when they got the idea for P&P.

Peacocks-did you mean the Rooks cawing in the "Lettr" scene? It's at the beginning of the second "adaptation" archive, I think.

Robert Hardy, also, as Churchill. One of his best roles, IMHO, and he really looked like Churchill!!

We should watch this together on line in the drawing room. I'd kind of hate to do it with a movie that needs to be attended to and worshipped. But this one would be appropriately Mystery Science 2000-like.

Amy: Mystery Science 3000-like. Definately! We could come up with much better lines than the writers did! ;-)

I think it would be a hoot to do P&P2 that way. We all know it so well, that we wouldn't exactly have to be attentive to the screen while watching.

I bought Northanger Abbey some months ago. I was very glad when I found it, �cause I thought it was something like the other adaptations. But it is horrible! I watched halfway and then I gave up. Now I�m gonna watch it again. Not because I think it�ll be better, but because it�s so fun discussing with you.

I just watched NA yesterday. Yuccckkkk!!!! I had previously read the book. A lot of it didn't seem to match. Candace your remarks about Stephen Tyler and Keith Richards--ROFLOL. It seems to be doing them an injustice. I believe that even Dennis Rodman uses less makeup. The food plates in the bath were a mystery to me. The hair and makeup of the Thorpes was too much. I know they're supposed to be crass, But come on. Henry Tilney was okay once they left Bath. Catherine did a good job. I don't think I could watch it again unless it was a Mystery Science Theater 3000 experience.