"Enjoyable Modern Retelling"
What You Need To Know:
LITTLE WOMEN (2018) has a strong moral worldview stressing family. Each character shows a different characteristic, either compassionate, loyal, or carrying. Much of the movie shows characters having to learn a lesson or learning how to be more selfless. Though this is true, this version of LITTLE WOMEN has less of a Christian spiritual emphasis than the other versions, including the 1994 version, which contained beautiful, poignant scenes about Christian faith. This version seems to be trying to make the faith elements too subtle.
Content:
More Detail:
The beloved story by Louisa May Alcott, LITTLE WOMEN (2018), is coming back to the big screen as a modern adaptation. LITTLE WOMEN is a fun re-telling of the story with a positive moral worldview but is discombobulated and left out some wonderful Christian faith elements in the original book.
The March family is composed of four sisters: Meg, Jo, Beth and Amy. Jo is the most vocal of the four, always leading the others in theater productions in their attic. When a new neighborhood boy comes to town and moves into the biggest home on the street, the girls question who it is. One day Meg opens the door, and the boy’s tutor, named Brooke, introduces himself to the girls.
Meg makes Jo go to a party with her at the house of a very popular girl. Jo of course doesn’t want to go, but would rather stay home and write. Finally, she says she will and when they go, Meg leaves Jo to go see a boy she likes. Walking around the house, Jo stumbles into a room with a boy already there, who turns out to be the neighbor, named Laurie. For hours, Laurie and Jo entertain each other, reciting poetry and plays, amongst everything. After some time, Meg is pushed in to the pool and feels humiliated, so Laurie, Jo and Meg leave the party. From this point, Laurie hangs out with Jo and the sisters all the time and is even invited in to their secret attic hangouts.
Flash forward a few years, and Jo has finished her huge novel and presents it to some professors at her college. When each professor turns down her novel, she’s enraged, thinking they have made a big mistake. One of the professors, Freddy, tells Meg he will read it and give her notes. He then becomes her editor, and the two work closely on the revisions.
Meanwhile, Beth has been sick since she was young, beating cancer, and Jo just receives word the cancer has re-appeared. Now, the family must look towards each other for love and comfort during this tough time of sickness.
The original LITTLE WOMEN by Louisa May Alcott is an incredible story that audiences love, relating deeply to the characters and their stories. Thus, it’s hard to go wrong with the stories in LITTLE WOMEN. This rendition of LITTLE WOMEN is well done, with the main actor playing Jo, Sarah Davenport, doing a great job portraying the strong and opinionated Jo that audiences know. Though this is the case, it would have been nice for the writer of this version to show a bit more of a character arc for Jo’s transformation into a more compassionate person. Also, the movie flips back and fourth through time periods and would have flowed better if it was chronological. Overall though, the movie is enjoyable and everyone will want to be apart of the March family.
LITTLE WOMEN (2018) has a strong moral worldview stressing family bonds. Each character shows a different characteristic, either compassionate, loyal, or carrying. Much of the movie shows characters having to learn a lesson or learning how to be more selfless. Though this is the case, this version of LITTLE WOMEN stresses this quality less than the 1994 version starring Winona Ryder, which also had beautiful, poignant scenes about Christian faith. This version seems to be trying to make the faith elements extremely subtle, and Jo’s transformation to loving someone more than herself, very subtle.