Following on from her Oscar-nominated Lady Bird, Greta Gerwig has adapted and directed Louisa May Alcott’s classic American novel Little Women.
The production is on an entirely different scale to Gerwig’s early films. This has a huge cast of characters, headed by Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Florence Pugh, Eliza Scanlen, Laura Dern, Timothée Chalamet and Meryl Streep, backed up with hundreds of extras and a vast crew. But Gerwig has grasped it with a steady hand and delivered a faithful rendition, with a few minor dramatic changes, of this much-loved story based on the impossible, goody-goody, close-knit, loving family of four daughters (Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy) and their matriarchal, socially conscious mother, Marmee (Laura Dern). All kitted out in wonderful costumes by Jacqueline Durran. The family’s father is off involved with the civil war for 95% of the film. I’m sure you all know the story.
For the main protagonist, Jo March, Gerwig has turned again to her Lady Bird star Saoirse Ronan to play an almost identically argumentative main character: the feisty, emancipated, pushy, would-be writer Jo March, but transported back to the 19th century. Rather than running the tale in a conventional linear form, Gerwig effortlessly inserts flashbacks and forwards to great effect. It is sumptuously shot by Yorick le Saux on 35 mm in glorious Massachusetts through the seasons, all lovingly captured.
It reminded me of Orson Welles’ The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), also set in the 19th century, with its frantic tracking shots and overlapping dialogue – all used by Gerwig in this film.
At times Little Women, it’s like flicking through a Montgomery Ward & Co mail-order catalogue; at other times, it’s like looking at the most beautiful Victorian Christmas card.
It is a charming film, and its release date of 25th December will make it the Christmas movie.