Pride and Prejudice (1940)
Directed by Robert Z. Leonard

Film Review

Hollywood has always had something of a reputation for taking great works of literature, chewing them up and spitting out something that is the meanest approximation to the original, as often as not sacrificing artistic integrity for the sake of a snatchy tagline and a quick buck.  MGM's big budget adaptation of Jane Austen's perennial favourite, Pride and Prejudice, evinces a fair degree of advanced liberty taking but the end product is surprisingly faithful to the original and is a good natured romp which only the most diehard of Austen enthusiasts would disdain.  Yes, we can justifiably cringe at the decision to forward the story by at least three decades just so that prettier costumes could be worn, and the scene in which Elizabeth Bennet proves her archery skills is downright ridiculous, but these indulgences are easily forgiven as the film's authors somehow managed to distil Austen's complex social satire into a pleasing romantic comedy.

With both Greer Garson and Laurence Olivier looking frankly dull and uninspired as the romantic leads it is left to the supporting actors to liven things up and bring a little colour into the proceedings.  Mary Boland's Mrs Bennet is the star attraction, her incorrigible matchmaking exploits providing a rich vein of humour which the film mines to death.  Edmund Gwenn is just as entertaining as the put-upon Mr Bennet, his deadpan humorous asides articulating the quiet despair of a tired old man overwhelmed by a household of hyperactive women who are pathologically obsessed with the mating ritual.  Edna May Oliver's arrival on screen is long overdue but when she does finally turn up, as the psychotically fastidious Lady Catherine de Bourgh, she steals the show and makes us wish Austen had made hers the central character in the narrative.

One surprising name in the screenwriting credits is that of Aldous Huxley, the celebrated British writer who is best known for his 1931 novel Brave New World.  To support himself after his move to America in the late 1930s, Huxley turned his hand to screenwriting on a few Hollywood films and Pride and Prejudice was the first film for which he received a credit in this capacity.  Previously, his script for Mervyn LeRoy's Madame Curie (1943) had been rejected by MGM on the grounds that it was 'too literary' and he quickly realised that the life of a Hollywood screenwriter was not for him.

Whilst it is put to shame by some subsequent screen adaptations (notably the impeccable 1995 BBC television series) this good-natured version of Pride and Prejudice has a great deal to commend it.  Beautifully photographed by Karl Freund, a master of German expressionism who had worked on Fritz Lang's Metropolis (1927), the film is visually stunning, its impressive art design winning an Oscar in 1941.  The script sparkles with wit and is performed with relish by a remarkable ensemble.  Jane Austen has endured far worse treatment than this over the years and for once Hollywood has done her proud.

Film Synopsis

In England of the early 1800s, Mrs Bennet's constant worry is the fate of her five daughters, each of whom has yet to acquire a suitable husband.  Naturally, Mrs Bennet is anxious that her daughters should marry into money, as the prosperity the Bennets presently enjoy will be taken away from them when Mr Bennett dies and his estate passes to Mr Collins, under the terms of an earlier inheritance.  When two eligible young men - Mr Bingley and Mr Darcy - take up residence at Netherfield Mrs Bennet sees an opportunity to marry off her two eldest daughters, Jane and Elizabeth.  Whilst Jane falls for Mr Bingley, Elizabeth is repulsed by Mr Darcy, seeing him as an proud and arrogant man.  Elizabeth's prejudice against Darcy appears to be vindicated when he dissuades Bingley from marrying Jane.  When Darcy later offers to marry her Elizabeth rejects him in an instant but later comes to realise that she may have misjudged him...