Greer Garson's too old Elizabeth Bennet

Elizabeth NEVER professes to be twenty in the damn film. Please.

People who have not read the novel dislike the movie because in the novel she professes to be twenty. . . You need help.

No, people do NOT have valid claims against the movie IF those complaints are based on their vision of the Austen novel, and NOT THE VISION OF THE FILM MAKERS, ACTORS, WRITERS, ETC...

What is particularly irksome is that when one holds one version so high it can distract or distort your vision of another version of it. You cannot see the greatness of the film because you have before you, constantly, the novel.
I am familiar with this because I do it all the time myself... with music.

This is not only foolish, it is a shame.

It is the kind of thing that children do.

So let's all try to grow up in our aesthetic attitudes. Movies are movies. Novels are novels. And this movie was based not on the novel but an a play based on the novel. Jesus!

Or, better, why don't all you Austen "heads" take this argument where it belongs, to the Austen Society website. Here is a link:

http://www.jasna.org/


Good bye!!!!

Old arguement, and always one pursued by fans of later versions. Greer Garson gives an extraordinary performance as Elizabeth, some of the later actresses simply don't come across as having the intellect to be credible Lizzies. And they often play her a little too bitchy. Lizzie is a sharp wit but she is always a lady and never truly malicious.

Greer is perfection in the part. Funny nobody crabbed she was too old for the role for some 50 years. People now know her true age (she was publicized at the time as being born in 1908 or 1914 instead of 1904) so that hold that against her. I doubt very much you would find a film review published in 1940 saying she seemed too old for the part.

Would someone kindly point out to me exactly which P&P costumes were "recycled" from GONE WITH THE WIND. This appears to be an urban legend created by fans of the 1994 P&P. They are apparently unaware that GWTW may have been released by MGM but it was filmed by David O. Selznick at his own studio not at MGM . So those costumes would have been owned by Selznick Studios and I cannot imagine MGM, by far the largest studio of the era buying another studio's used costumes, indeed it appears very rare that they recycled wardrobes they already owned.

If you like the 95 P&P, you need to see the 80 P&P w/Elizabeth Garvie & David Rintoul. It was like having someone read my mind & out it on film.

Those who study history are doomed to watch others repeat it.

I agree that the film should be regarded as a totally different entity, so I won't complain about its diversions from the book. Like a lot of other posters have said, it's a movie that's BASED ON the book, not word-for-word performance.

However, that being said, Greer Garson's age compared to the other women (mainly Elizabeth's sisters) was distracting. In fact, I found it so distracting that I believe it took away from the film.

On another note, the imdb trivia section says that Vivien Leigh was almost cast as Elizabeth. I haven't any clue as to whether or not she would have been a better actress for the part, but she certainly was substantially younger than Garson. It makes one wonder why the director chose to go with a more mature actress, one who was a bit "long in the tooth" as another poster said.

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