At a certain point, oft-loved (and oft-adapted) classics, such as the works of Jane Austen, transcend their status as simple stories. They’re standards; myths; anthems whose value in each successive generation stems from how some beloved beats are adhered to whilst others are omitted entirely by a free-styling soloist having their way on a jazz bass. Or a pianoforte.I imagine most audiences who see this October’s vintage of Sense and Sensibility will know the tale from Austen’s pen, and plenty more around 40 and up due to the sublime 1995 screen adaptation, courtesy of Ang Lee and Emma Thompson. Thirty-one years is nearly a lifetime, yet that pairing, plus many other idyllic choices in a production that includes Alan Rickman and Hugh Grant among its ranks, makes the ‘90s movie a tough act to follow. So the greatest compliment I can pay director Georgia Oakley and screenwriter Diana Reid is that they found new music in the Austen songbook, making it fresh, occasionally electric, and wholly inviting to a new generation. Even when it’s hardly definitive.cnx.cmd.push(function() {cnx({playerId: "106e33c0-3911-473c-b599-b1426db57530",}).render("0270c398a82f44f49c23c16122516796");});Eschewing the whimsy and irony that’s colored many of the Austen films in recent years, Oakley and Reid’s approach to the Dashwood Sisters is intensely earnest with an understated, almost aching sense of naturalism. The juxtaposition of the wild, unkempt world encroaching on these mannered Georgians’ civility is a fixation for Oakley’s camera and the pastoral, nigh primordial production design by Francesca Di Mottola. It’s certainly in young Esmé Creed-Miles’ wide, willful eyes. A newcomer to the screen, Creed-Miles’ interpretation of Marianne is introduced practically barefoot and feral, but never bedraggled, as she runs through a wooded forest that befits this more stoic conception of the Dashwoods.As in all versions, the sisters Elinor (Daisy Edgar-Jones), Marianne, and pint-sized Margaret (Bodhi Rae Breathnach) are victims of a patriarchal system that has cast them off after their half-brother John (Tom Brooke) inherits their father’s entire estate, and John’s calculating wife Fanny (Stacy Martin) convinces her husband to set the girls adrift—out into a civilized wilderness where women of former means are unable to seek an income at all except through the pact of marriage.The most promising prospects, at least initially, seem to be Fanny’s far kinder brother Edward Ferrars (George MacKay), a dashing if shy man, and John Willoughby (Frank Dillane), who no one would accuse of shyness. Willoughby’s brash, roguish quality is in fact what draws the attention of the hopeless romantic Marianne, whereas Edward’s gentility is what attracts practical Elinor. Neither is exactly what he appears, however, and the courtships of all are interrupted by the mysterious and brooding colonial war hero, Colonel Brandon (Herbert Nordrum).The notes will be familiar for even those who have never read or seen another adaptation of Sense and Sensibility, but it is how the filmmakers play them which give the movie a genuine grace and warmth. At the start of the movie, the lost Dashwood home of Norland Park seems perpetually bathed in sunset’s magic-hour glow, no matter the time of day. The grounds are drowned in a sea of unconquerable grass; it’s a vision where the natural urges that Marianne is forced to contain, and that Elinor dutifully sets aside, are constantly threatening to erupt beneath their feet. Whereas many modern Austen movies have rediscovered the author’s sardonic wit missed by most high school classrooms, or have upped the romantic sweep into a tumblr daydream, this film takes place in a kind of autumnal snow globe, save fallen leaves have replaced white powder. It’s picturesque but in a sweetly forlorn way, a bit like being an adolescent literally constrained by the clothes around your neck.The aforementioned Creed-Miles best encapsulates this with an Austenite heroine who has not been modernized, but still reveals a fire and anger at her predicament that might catch some viewers familiar with the character by surprise. It’s a performance that promises audiences will see more of the young thespian down the line, and which intriguingly becomes more the heart of the movie than her sister Elinor’s own constant need to sacrifice her own happiness.Daisy Edgar-Jones, who was so impressive in Fresh, makes for a serviceable and appropriately anguished Elinor, the good daughter who can more easily see Mr. Willoughby for the cad he is. But the love story between her and MacKay’s bashful Edward seems fairly pro forma in a movie better preoccupied with sensibility than sense. Yet perhaps in a stronger sense, the film shrewdly seems to evade some of the narrative beats that have become quoted and meme’d favorites among Austenites since 1995. Without giving too much away, the confrontation between the ruthless Fanny and enterprising Lucy Steele (Ceara Coveney) is discreetly avoided onscreen, as is a famed double wedding sequence.But then the romance seems nearly secondary in a film more intrigued about the sisterly affections that tie Elinor and Marianne together than the men who could, theoretically, separate them forever. It is the sisters’ love that is most paramount to surviving in this film’s vision of a Darwinian English marriage system, and it is sweeping in its big-hearted feeling. Whereas certain romantic sequences might feel like a box to check, the agony Elinor and Marianne take on for one another, shouldering grief and joy as a team, imbues the movie with literally bittersweet chemistry. And even then, the film can still make its own innovations to the traditional love stories, including an unexpectedly giddy and wry resolution to the Willoughby and Brandon rivalry. Fiona Shaw’s Mrs. Jennings, meanwhile, is a delightful scene-stealer.Ultimately, this 2026 rendezvous makes for another charming visit with the Dashwoods. The conversation is lively, the atmosphere happy in its own delicately hushed way, and the presentation exquisite. I have doubts if it will be one I will be speaking wistfully about in another 30 years, but at the end of the day I don’t think it is made for those already hung up on the Willoughbys of our youth. For those younger audiences who have never met the Dashwoods, or perhaps only in a 12th grade classroom, this Sense and Sensibility will become the standard. That’s worth getting swept up in.Sense and Sensibility opens on Sept. 25 in the UK and on Oct. 16 in the U.S.The post Sense and Sensibility Review: A Surprisingly Bittersweet Jane Austen for New Generations appeared first on Den of Geek.