Yes, I, a man, can enjoy an occasional Jane Austen-inspired movie, too. For instance, I highly recommend Pride and Prejudice (1940, with Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier), Sense and Sensibility (1995, with Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet) and Emma (1996, with Gwyneth Paltrow and Jeremy Northam). This new version of Emma takes a more satirical, sardonical tack, and I don’t like it as much as the 1996 version.

Autumn de Wilde’s film drags through its first half, I felt, but then finds its footing in the second half, when Emma Woodhouse (the beguiling Anya Taylor-Joy) genuinely grieves about and tries to help her friend Harriet Smith (Mia Goth). Meanwhile, Mr. Nightley (Jeremy Flynn) tries to understand his feelings for Emma while advising her to stop her ill-fated attempts at matchmaking. It is gentle drawing room material given a sometimes jarring undercurrent of class difference drama, but which is mainly presented as irony.

And it is a female-centric version. The men are silly and bumptious, ever being manipulated by women and unsure of how to act. The women are at the heart of the story and they seem to be all that matter. That would be fine if they actually had things to do, as in Little Women. Here, it means scrambling for the right man with which to spend the rest of one’s life. The first part of the story is unnecessarily episodic, with too-brief scenes and not enough development. Things only get interesting in the second part, when Emma sees her plans fail and begin to cause problems for her friends.

The film is handsomely mounted and boasts good costumes. I like the way the cinematographer (Christopher Blauvelt) uses a variety of camera angles to direct one’s eye, and that the cast members sing their own songs. But I was bored for a time, and the strong second half is not enough to erase my good memories of Douglas McGrath’s 1996 version, which I found utterly charming. See this one, by all means, but then do yourself a favor and go watch that version, too. ☆ ☆ 1/2. 18 March 2020.