Little Women

Little Women. I finally finished the book (a couple of months ago). It took a few years to plow through and in the end, it was a wonderful, lovely story that we're still reading more than 150 years later. Those kinds of books are fantastic.

But the dense story clogs up the emotion. When you sort through all of the minutiae and social commentary, the vignettes about the four sisters are wonderful.

I rented the latest version of the movie and watched it tonight, the one from the mid-90s with Christian Bale, Winona Ryder and Kirsten Dunst. I haven't seen the movie in years and chopped the movie into half itself in my memories. I was horrified by Amy's insolence as a child (Dunst) and hated her bitterly for marrying Laurie in the end. Meg I didn't bother to remember at all and I was creeped out my Beth's death speech (Claire Danes). And all I could really remember of Jo was her disgusting make out session with an old guy at the end.

Oh how wrong I was. I am so glad I finally read this fabulous tale. And while I loved the book, the movie was also amazing. This is one case where I can't say which I liked better - the movie or the book. The movie of course condenses the story, but aptly cuts the minutiae that bugged me so much in the book. All of the actors fully conveyed the emotions of their characters. Beth's death speech wasn't so creepy this time, but heartbreaking. And Jo's jealously when Meg gets married is so easy to empathize with. Amy marrying Laurie? Yeah, totally get it after reading the book and the movie does it justice. Susan Sarandon was Marmee and she was perfect, something I never would have expected.

I put the movie in expecting to be entertained and maybe slightly annoyed. I was amazed. The movie is going onto my all-time favorites list. I was crying at the hour mark and probably would have cried more except that Jon called and I had to pause the Christmas tearjerker. And from the one hour thirty-four minute mark, I sobbed. Death, babies, love . . . come on! Oh, but it was so good. I'm so glad I decided to rewatch it.