Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1441 in DVD
• Released on: 2008-04-28
• Rating: Parental Guidance
• Formats: PAL, Colour
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 85 minutes

Amazon.co.uk Review
A BBC costume drama that focuses in on author Jane Austen as she heads towards her 40s, Miss Austen Regrets is a fine piece of television, grounded by a terrific performance from Olivia Williams (best remembered still for her supporting role in The Sixth Sense).

Miss Austen Regrets finds the title character at a point where her writing career has already proved to be a success. However, there’s the small matter of romance, which throws up a key paradox: given that Austen’s books deal with the matter so well, how has she failed to properly address it in her personal life?

It’s an interesting dynamic for a drama, and it works particularly well. Miss Austen Regrets finds her considering some of her past choices, and whether she’s made the right choices along the way. And buoyed by the aforementioned Williams and Imogene Poots as her young niece, it makes for highly enjoyable and rewarding television.

Miss Austen Regrets sits happily alongside the recent film Becoming Jane as an interesting and well-measured dig into the author’s life. And with good production values matched by a fine cast, it proves worthy not just as a fine drama, but the kind that’ll be enjoyed time after time. Recommended. --Jon Foster

DVD Description
Olivia Williams, Greta Scacchi and Hugh Bonneville lead an all-star cast in BBC One’s feature-length period drama Miss Austen Regrets.

Beautifully shot and graced with a splendid performance by Olivia Williams, this Jane Austen biopic focuses on a relatively narrow window in the author’s life, serving as something of a companion to Becoming Jane, the 2007 film about a young Austen starring Anne Hathaway.

This drama depicts a passionate and emotional chapter of Jane Austen’s romantic life, inspired by the great writer’s own novels, letters and diaries.

As Jane Austen approaches her 40s, her success as a writer is assured and her witty and sharply observed romantic novels are widely admired. To her niece, Fanny Knight – a young, pretty girl desperate to fall in love – Jane is a favourite aunt who offers the wisdom and knowledge to help her in her own search for a happy marriage.

Yet, when asked by Fanny to help her vet potential husbands, Jane's usual confident composure is threatened. Surely the woman so capable of writing love on the page must have experienced love herself, so why did she never marry?

Protected by her wit, Jane has presented a front as dazzling as many of her novels' young heroines, but as she reflects on her own romantic encounters and affairs, we are drawn into the passions, suitors and choices of her life – the cruel flirting, the proposals spurned and the love that seemed to arrive too late.

As she recalls missed opportunities, the doubts arise. Did she make the right choice for herself and her family? Could the great romantic expert have been mistaken? And, could her principles about love and marriage possibly have been ill-judged?

Starring:
Jane Austen - Olivia Williams
Fanny Austen-Knight - Imogene Poots
Cassandra - Greta Scacchi
Harris Bigg - Samuel Roukin
Rev. Brook Bridges - Hugh Bonneville
Charles Haden - Jack Huston

Written by Gwyneth Hughes. Directed by Jeremy Lovering. Produced by Anne Pivcevic and Jamie Laurenson.

Synopsis
A passionate and emotional story of Jane Austen’s romantic life, inspired by the great writer’s own novels, letters and diaries. As Jane Austen approaches her forties, her success as a writer is assured and her witty and sharply observed romantic novels are widely admired. To her niece, Fanny Knight – a young, pretty girl desperate to fall in love – Jane is a favourite aunt who offers the wisdom and knowledge to help her in her own search for a happy marriage. Yet, when asked by Fanny to help her vet potential husbands, Jane's usual confident composure is threatened. Surely the woman so capable of writing love on the page must have experienced love herself, so why did she never marry?

Protected by her wit, Jane has presented a front as dazzling as many of her novels' young heroines, but as she reflects on her own romantic encounters and affairs, we are drawn into the passions, suitors and choices of her life – the cruel flirting, the proposals spurned and the love that seemed to arrive too late. As she recalls missed opportunities, the doubts arise. Did she make the right choice for herself and her family? Could the great romantic expert have been mistaken? And, could her principles about love and marriage possibly have been ill-judged?

Customer Reviews

The closest to the real Jane and the best biopic... so far
Any kind of dramatisation of Jane Austen's life is going to be a tough nut to crack. Enigmatic with almost no first hand descriptions of her or her personality and not even an official portrait so that no one knows for sure what she actually looked like (you think you do know, but the image you have of Austen in your mind is almost certainly the product of a victorian artist's imagination) Austen's uneventful life is not exactly the stuff that dramas are usually made of.

This production makes an admirable stab at the attempt however. Olivia Williams is well cast (just the right age, and good enough an actress to carry the role) of the later Jane in the last year and a half of her life (Williams may be be better known to Jane afficionados as playing the part of Jane Fairfax in ITV's dramatisation of "Emma" 10 years or so ago). She makes surely the performance of her life here. Simply wonderful.

I was impressed the script writer's obvious knowledge of the subject and the extensive use of quotes from Jane's letters, and even Cassandra's "She was the sun of my life, the gilder of every pleasure, the soother of every sorrow" quote from the letter written to Fanny immediately after Jane's death.

If you've read Austen's letters and the few eye witness accounts of her you'll be impressed with the faithfullness of the depiction of Jane. Olivia's Jane was witty with a well developed sense of humour, with also a cleverness that reminded me of the letters, and a "keen sense of humour... (that) oozed out of her, very much in Mr Bennet's style", as someone who knew her later recalled. On the whole I'd say it was about 80% accurate to what I'd imagined her to be like. Perhaps not quite clever enough, and not quite witty enough, to be entirely the Jane of the letters, but a pretty good representation nonetheless.

Jane mercilessly mocks the Prince Regent's chaplain the Revd James Stanier Clarke and dazzles everyone with her brilliance, and looses more than a few caustic barbs. Almost all of which is quoted almost verbatim from her letters and other writings. And this is were the film succeeds best of all: it does convey something of her brilliance and wit, as well her intimidating intellect.

In the film she hides behind a mask of her own indifference to affairs of the heart, but there are enough chinks in her armour especially with her interest in Mr Haden to suggest that she was as vunerable to a charming handsome rogue as any of her heroines and had he made a move... well, lets just say I don't think she would have remained unmoved. Which all makes for some wonderful fiction, but fiction and speculation it remains.

The most powerful, and fictional, scene in the film is where her mother confront her over her failure to accept Harris Bigg's offer of marriage which dramatises possibly the biggest conundrum in Austen's life: why did she accept an offer of marriage from Harris Wither? Sure, she rejected him because she didn't love him, that we can understand, but why did she accept him in the first place? In this dramatisation the reason is given that Cassandra couldn't bear to be parted from her sister and so persuaded her to change her mind. Now, I don't believe that that to be true in this instance, but it does dramatise an argument for Jane's never marrying: could she ever have bared to be parted from the single most important person in her entire life? (Her dalliance of 20 years earlier with Tom Lefroy is briefly mentioned, but the stating here that he meant nothing to her that he was "not the one", is something I also fundamentally disagree with. It also dramatises her somewhat distant relationship with her mother: distant emotionally, even if physically and probably uncomfortably, close.

After some unrealistic dramatisations of Austen's life recently recently I really wasn't expecting too much from this at all, but I was pleasantly surprised. From initially expecting something very dull and ordinary instead I found something very fine, powerful, moving and ultimately very sad. Just as any depiction of Jane's later life should be.

Very mixed emotions
I am a huge fan of Jane Austen and when I saw 'Becoming Jane' last year, I was very disappointed in the movie. When I discovered that this was being created, I thought it would be much better. I considered Olivia Williams much more suited to the role; I think she's got more classical English features, shall we say.

As for 'Miss Austen Regrets', I just cannot make up my mind. On the one hand, the acting, particularly from Williams, was excellent and I felt more connected to this dramatisation than 'Becoming Jane'. However, on the other hand, there were times when I just couldn't make up my mind about the characters. Certainly in the beginning, Jane Austen came across as immature and often cruel, belittling people and laughing at their expense. I know that she was very good at reading people and perhaps because I am a fan of Austen, it was hard to see that potential side of them. For me, though, there were times when I just didn't like Austen at all.

I think the uncertainty regarding whether I liked the characters has influenced my overall opinions. It was finely acted, but I just cannot say I overly enjoyed watching the production - though I hasten to add that I still prefer it over 'Becoming Jane'. At this stage, I do not know whether I would consider buying it. My advice - rent it first to find out your opinion. Don't buy it unless you know you like it.

An antidote to 'Becoming Jane'
I did not intend to watch this, luckily channel-hopping can have its uses and when I saw that Olivia Williams was the lead I knew I would not be subjected to such abysmal fictions as Jane doing a Lydia Bennett with Tom Lefroy. We are treated instead to the not entirely sympathetic lively Jane of the letters - caustic wit, flirting, dancing - with for the most part plausible inventions. There are of course a few of the expected tortuous dramatisations of utter speculation and perhaps you could turn spotting the usual quotes into a game to ease the almost physical pain of hearing 'Two inches of ivory' indiscriminately applied again. A lovely film overall.