Lost in Austen--Thoughts on the Movie

I NetFlix'd this movie, and watched it the other night. It was interesting, but just not my cup of tea. The main reason I didn't really like it was because the main character, Amanda Price, was obviously a Mary Sue, and the entire movie was about fulfilling her wish to replace Elizabeth Bennett and marry Mr. Darcy herself. Meanwhile, Elizabeth took Amanda's place in modern-day London and became a macrobiotic nanny who knows how to use Google. That just seems completely wrong to me. Not to mention, all of the male characters, at one point or another, fell over their own tongues to pursue Amanda, and Mrs. Bennett, Jane and Caroline de Bourge all either hated or liked her depending on which part of the plot they were in.

A few of the other characters had some differences as well. They were fun differences, but ultimately just fed the Mary Sue theme. For instance, Caroline Bingley was portrayed as a lesbian who only pursued Mr. Darcy because of his money and society's expectations that she marry (which she revealed to Amanda because Amanda had told Mr. Bingley she was a lesbian in order to get him to stop going after her and go after Jane Bennett instead). Also, Georgiana Darcy and Mr. Wickham were shown to be opposite their characters in the actual book--in the movie, Wickham had allowed his name to be dragged through the mud, because Georgiana had actually tried to seduce him, but she was afraid that Mr. Darcy would kick her out if he knew that.

So, while it was interesting, I'd have to give Lost in Austen a less-than-stellar review, due to the fact that its whole plot was solely a form of wish fullfillment.