Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
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Post by Kristie on Sept 9, 2007 14:01:28 GMT -5
So a few of us have read Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding, and maybe the sequel as well, Bridget Jones: The Edge of Reason. So my thought was to discuss the similarities of the Bridget Jones books with Austen's novels, Pride and Prejudice and Persuasion of which themes are taken for Fielding's writings.
And I guess it could be interesting to see what everyone would think of more Bridget Jones book based on other Austen novels, like Emma.
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Sept 9, 2007 15:53:41 GMT -5
You know Kristie, I was thinking about the same thing the other day, I was wondering how Helen Fielding could steal another one of Jane Austen's plots to write another Bridget Jones novel. Perhaps Emma would work if, I don't know, Mark Darcy dies and so Bridget becomes a very rich widow - she decides to remain single and occupies her time trying to match her friend Sharon up and ends up falling in love herself... I don't know, do you think that could work?! I once gave a talk about the similarities between the first BJD and P&P, but I can't remember all the details. Basically, I talked about how a modernized version of the plot of P&P works because dating has become so complicated now, especially for people in their 30s like Bridget. How many days should I wait before returning his call? How many dates before it's OK to make out? We've been dating for 5 months - is it OK to say I love you or is he gonna freak out?! It's like the Regency era all over again, when there were a countless number of social rules to follow.
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
Posts: 7,214
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Post by Kristie on Sept 9, 2007 15:59:28 GMT -5
I think it could be really interesting to have Bridget match up Shaz, but that does leave the problem of Mark needing to die to really make it like Emma.
What about Northanger Abbey? If whenMark and Bridget marry, she learns the gruesome truth of his father or something, even if that's not exactly the plot line of the book lol I think Bridget could do many Austenish things in her life.
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Sept 9, 2007 19:52:23 GMT -5
Bridget does have a lot in common with the character of Catherine from Northanger Abbey, I can totally picture her getting sucked in some kind of fake mystery story, that would be hilarious ;D
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Lu
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Post by Lu on Sept 10, 2007 13:22:21 GMT -5
Good idea, it'd be so interesting, I think Northanger Abbey would be good, better than Emma (if Mark needs to die..), I agree with jefie, a Bridget-Catherine would be really hilarious. I was wondering about Mansfield Park...
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
Posts: 7,214
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Post by Kristie on Sept 10, 2007 14:19:16 GMT -5
I think that Mansfield Park could be a little tough because Fanny has tons of siblings, although she doesn't live with them, and is almost trapped into an engagement with horrible Mr. Crawford. I don't know how well it would work with a Bridget-Fanny, and I definitely don't see how there could be a version of Sense and Sensibility since that's got a lot of sisterly bonding in it.
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Lu
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Post by Lu on Sept 10, 2007 14:49:03 GMT -5
I don't think Bridget has much in common with Fanny Price I haven't though about Sense and Sensibility. In P&P there are sisters too but...I can't imagine a story based on S&S without sisterly bonding and without the contrast between Elinor and Marianne. I haven't read Bridget Jones books yet, but I really want to, I only saw the movies.
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Sept 10, 2007 14:50:42 GMT -5
Yeah, same here, Fanny is so quiet and subdued, she's pretty much everything Bridget isn't!
I think in the first movie it was very easy to make the connection with P&P, but the second movie really moved away from the plot of Persuasion. The similarities with Jane Austen are much more obvious in the novels than in the movies...
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
Posts: 7,214
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Post by Kristie on Sept 10, 2007 15:43:29 GMT -5
Yeah, I definitely didn't know BJ2 was based on Persuasion and I wouldn't have know better if I hadn't read the book.
Just a quick question: Did anyone else find Bridget's obsession with Colin Firth's Mr. Darcy in the BBC P&P slightly ironic with the fact that he plays Mark in the movies? I couldn't help but picture Renee Zellweger and Colin Firth in the books and it was weird that Bridget's character is in love with the man who plays her love interest.
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Sept 10, 2007 20:08:24 GMT -5
I know, and I remember when the movie was in production there was this whole debate about who Bridget was going to interview instead of Colin Firth (oh man, that interview in the book was soooo funny! So tell me again about your wet shirt?!?!). For a while there were rumours it was going to be George Clooney but then they just decided not to include this scene in the script.
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Lu
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Post by Lu on Sept 14, 2007 4:05:35 GMT -5
I din't know about that sounds funny. Speaking of Emma, I think Mark would be a good Mr Knightley, I can easily picture him in that role. And what about Edward Ferrars?? Did Bridget have an obsession for him/actor playing him while she was dating Daniel??
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Isa
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Post by Isa on Sept 14, 2007 7:25:00 GMT -5
Colin Firth could play the main character's love interest in every Austen movie adaptation as far as I'm concerned ;D Well, maybe not Edward Ferrars, Hugh Grant really nailed that one and I couldn't picture anyone else but him play that part.
I can't remember if the name of Hugh Grant came up in the Bridget Jones novel, I don't think so but I could be wrong. I love that they picked him to play Daniel though, he'd always played good guys before so it was a bit of a shock to see him coming out of that elevator the first time looking a bit (a lot) sleazy, lol!
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Kristie
Novel turned into BBC miniseries
"If a book is well written, I always find it too short."
Posts: 7,214
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Post by Kristie on Sept 14, 2007 14:06:21 GMT -5
In your guys' opinions, do you like the BBC miniseries movies, or the other movies that aren't BBC? While I like the BBC's truth to the novels, I still enjoy most of the other ones more because they seem of better movie quality (to me).
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Lu
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Post by Lu on Sept 14, 2007 14:08:42 GMT -5
Colin Firth could play the main character's love interest in every Austen movie adaptation as far as I'm concerned ;D I agree, totally agree ;D Yeah, I've always seen Hugh Grant playing the role of good guy but he's great in BJD movie, he's so funny since his first scene, coming out the elevator, lol. I saw BJD with my brother and he wanted to re-watch 20th times the scene where Bridget dreams about her wedding with Daniel and he says how their story began (I saw BJD in Italian, so I don't know his exact words in English), my brother couldn't stop laughing.
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neh
Collection of short stories published by an independent editor
"I live in two worlds; one is a world of books"
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Post by neh on Sept 14, 2007 18:58:31 GMT -5
I think Jefie's idea for a BJ version of Northanger Abbey would be genius indeed! I know i'd go see it, even if the second BJ book and film dissapointed. It's a perfect match, both in personality and in possible situations and mishaps. hehe. And call me stupid but i had honestly never made the connections between Persuassion and BJ2 before - Neh so silly! *bangs head on table*
Just a side note on Hugh - apart from his portrayl in SAS, which as Jefie said was perfect, i've always preferred Hugh in his less than lovely roles.... Daniel was one but i think that Hugh was brilliant in About A Boy - in my mind, i i doubt he will ever top that performance.
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