Image: Amazon
As the leader of The Verge’s Pride & Prejudice (2005) fan group, I obviously went to go see Emma last weekend. It was great! The trailer made me worried that the film would be too stylized and stark, but I was actually really impressed at how it balanced those elements were while still telling the straight story.
The film uses a lot of the stylized humor to set up its characters and world, then slowly fades it out as the drama ratchets up. Emma’s father is constantly ridiculous, a key love interest is dressed down before he’s built back up, and a secondary character is annoying to exaggerated lengths, nicely setting up how she later impacts the plot.
Finding that balance between stylized humor and natural storytelling always seems…