Jane Austen & Film: Interview with Dr. Katie Barnett

By guest writer Ruby Victoria

It’s the 250th anniversary of Jane Austen’s birth and at The Storyhouse in Chester, UK they are celebrating all things Austen with a season of film and theatre.

The Storyhouse is a thriving multipurpose building with a library, theatre, independent cinema, a restaurant, and is a community and creative social space. I am very fortunate to have this close to home, and recently I visited the Storyhouse to watch Joe Wright’s Pride and Prejudice at their cinema - which so happens to be celebrating its 20th anniversary this year too.

I then had the honour of interviewing Dr. Katie Barnett from Chester University on Jane Austen’s huge influence on film.

Thank you again Katie for agreeing to do this, really appreciate it! Firstly, could you give me a little introduction about yourself?

Hi Ruby – it’s great to chat Austen and film with you! I’m currently a senior lecturer in Film and Media Studies at the University of Chester, and I’ve been researching and teaching film for more than twelve years now. My main focus is American cinema and I’m particularly interested in representations of family, gender and adolescence – right now, I’m in the process of finishing my book about siblings in film.

I’d love to hear about how you first discovered Austen and the journey that took you on. What is it about Austen that spoke to you?

I actually came to Austen relatively late, sometime in my late 20s – in my defence, I studied American literature at university, so 19^th century British lit wasn’t really on my radar! (Of course, I had seen Clueless but had no idea at the time that it took inspiration from Emma.) Like a lot of people, I read Pride & Prejudice first and was really struck by how ‘modern’ it felt, despite the setting. Not long after that, I stumbled across the YouTube series The Lizzie Bennet Diaries, an updated version of P&P told in vlog format, and really enjoyed how it brought Lizzie and her sisters’ stories to a new audience. I love how Austen’s work can be adapted and updated endlessly – it really speaks to how universal a lot of her themes are. (I am a huge fan of Curtis Sittenfeld’s Eligible, for example – such a smart modern literary take on P&P.)

It’s the 20th anniversary of Joe Wright’s film adaptation of Pride & Prejudice this year. A film which still attracts lots of attention. It’s perhaps the adaptation that captures younger first time viewers the most, which is evident from its popularity on social media. What is it about this film that you think resonates with so many people, compared to other adaptations?

There is some stunning cinematography in Joe Wright’s version, of course, and he’s also on record as wanting to inject a kind of grittiness into the film, rather than making a slick ‘heritage’ film (which have always been popular in British cinema particul,arly). But I think that version also really captures the youthfulness of Elizabeth and does a great job of conveying what it’s like to fall in love when you’re young – there’s a kind of longing that Wright conveys really well through the visual language of the film.

Kiera Knightley famously played Elizabeth Bennet in this adaptation, alongside Rosamund Pike as her sister Jane. During an interview I saw recently, Rosamund highly praised Kiera for her performance and was baffled as to why they would bother making another one. I imagine this story won’t stop being adapted into a film or TV series, but what are your hopes for future versions? Is there a message that has been missing from previous adaptations? Is there something new to say?

I think you’re right, there will always be a new version on the horizon and, if they’re done well, they’ll always resonate because new audiences are often looking for ‘their’ version of a text. I’m all for new imaginings and like to think of them as adding to the wider story, rather than replacing anything that has come before.

Specifically in relation to Pride & Prejudice, I’d love to see the rehabilitation of Mrs Bennet, or a film focusing on some of the other sisters – there’s a lot of scope there, I think, to dig a little deeper into the ways women have historically dealt with a lack of choice, and how easy it is to dismiss women who have been limited by circumstance and expectations. It’s easy to root for the obvious heroines, but it would be interesting to see the focus turn to characters who have been embraced less enthusiastically – and to think about why.

Kiera Knightley in Pride & Prejudice (2005)

Adaptations without a narrator have been criticized for not feeling authentic enough to Austen's writing style. Hence why Clueless is revered as being the closest adaptation we have to her works. Do you think this is vital and a style that should be used more?

Narration can be a great tool in film, but it can also quickly feel clunky if it’s not done right, so I can understand why a lot of directors might steer clear of it. In film, you’ve also got visual tools at your disposal – the cinematography, the mise-en-scene – as well as the soundtrack, and that can limit the need for a character’s narration. I think the reason the narration in Clueless works so well is that Amy Heckerling, the director and writer, really captures Cher’s authentic voice right from the beginning, and the audience gets the feeling of being in an intimate conversation with a friend (“So, okay, you’re probably going, is this like, a Noxema commercial, or what?”). If the screenwriter can do that, then it’s a great tool for pulling the audience in and making them invest in the protagonist.

In terms of visual storytelling, which Austen themes do you think have been captured best in a film or tv adaptation?

Consistently, the visual aspects of storytelling really capture a sense of both desire and agency in Austen adaptations. In terms of desire, the scenes where characters declare their love or kiss for the first time are deliberate and lingering. The use of the close up is integral to this - being so close to the characters in these moments really emphasises the monumental nature of these moments, as the audience is holding their breath along with them.

The visual choices are also able to convey a sense of choice and agency, which is so crucial to Austen’s heroines. When Anne is running to find Wentworth at the end of the 2007 TV movie of Persuasion, for example, it really conveys that feeling of Anne taking control of her own life through that kinetic movement.

Are there any particular side characters from an Austen novel that you would like to see a film/TV series made about? For me, I would love a mini series on Pride & Prejudice’s Lady Catherine de Bourgh.

#JusticeForLydia (Pride and Prejudice), that’s all I’m saying. (Lady Catherine would be a great choice!) Miss Bates (Emma) would also be an interesting character to focus on.

When analysing film, I like to explore which gaze the director is seeking. Is there an Austen adaptation you believe speaks most to the female gaze?

This is a great question. In terms of the desiring female gaze, the obvious answer here might be the BBC adaptation of Pride & Prejudice and the infamous scene with Colin Firth emerging from the lake. (This is then cheekily ‘borrowed’ in Bridget Jones’s Diary, although it’s Hugh Grant and not Colin Firth in the water this time.) But the 2020 adaptation of Emma is also worth mentioning too, and I think it speaks to the female gaze in a more concentrated way. The dressing scene, with Johnny Flynn as Mr Knightley, is a great example of this: the audience is invited to really look. It’s not just that you see him briefly undressed, but the whole process asks – or allows – the audience to gaze upon a process that is usually hidden and intimate. And if you look at the lighting in the scene where Emma and Mr Knightley kiss, you’ll notice that it’s his profile that is lit more prominently, a tactic often used to highlight the female form in classic cinema. It’s subtle, but it draws the audience’s eye to him, in the same way Emma might look at him, aligning us with her.

Costume is an integral part of cinema for me and it’s very hard to separate Austen’s stories from the clothes. Which costume from an adaptation captured your attention the most?

There are some beautiful costumes in lots of different Austen adaptations, but special mention to Clueless here, which manages to incorporate some subtle Regency style into Cher’s wardrobe in her Empire-line burgundy dress (and later a green one in the same cut).

In terms of most memorable, it’s a toss up between Mark Darcy’s reindeer jumper in Bridget Jones’s Diary and Cher’s iconic yellow plaid combo in Clueless!

Lastly, I have to ask what film adaptation is your favourite and why?

The two I go back to most often are Clueless and the 2020 version of Emma: both lean into how smart and funny Austen is, and they are a joy to watch.