Jane Eyre – Movie Revew

Cary Fukunaga is here to stay ladies and gentleman. His feature film debut Sin Nombre was one of the best movies of that year. That isn’t overstating it either. That movie fucking rules!

Jane Eyre was just as good as his Nombre and I actually had the pleasure of having never seeing an adaptation of the novel and I haven’t read the book – so I was going in fresh.

For whatever reasons I liked the first Twilight movie a little. Jane Eyre had all the stuff that made that movie watchable, but did it really well. Whatever you call the genre, Gothic or whatever, Eyre took it to the extreme. It is a very stylistic interpretation that showed Fukunaga with complete command of his technique.

When I was watching it I couldn’t help but think that Fukunaga needs to make a horror movie. Like right now. The American horror genre needs a breath of fresh air and I think Fukunaga might have the tool-kit.

Eyre, at its core, is pretty much a princess story. Which was kind of disappointing to me. I was hoping for a Victor Hugo-type ending, but didn’t get it.

It follows Jane, played by Mia Wasikowska, who is treated like shit by her adopted parents when her folks die. She is sent to a boarding school where everyone is abusive and life is miserable. The  look of the movie is so good. The whole film is just drab and dark. It looks like Beauty and the Beast in black and white.

Jane gets out of the school and is hired as governess on a huge estate run by this dude Rochester played by Mike Fassbender. Like Twilight, the whole movie focuses on the fringe of desire, need, and virtues.

What makes this story in another universe of better is that Jane’s convictions are fucking believable and agreeable. She is a strong, intelligent, and virtuous, character. I don’t know if the movie would pass the Bechdel test, but it is certainly a movie women should look to for a good female character.

The whole movie is rested on Wasikowska and Fassbender. They deliver – big time. They have such a talent for making lines that sound a little contrived kind of good. Jane needs to have that “Ingrid Bergman at the end of Casablanca” face and make it fucking hardcore. Fassbender needs to be pathetic so we don’t think he’s abusing Jane.

It was such a tough balancing act.

The scene where Rochester begs her to marry him is easily my favorite. There is such a powerful feeling that just makes you want to scream for them to get together. But people have their convictions.

Lastly, my one huge complaint was that the kissing scene wasn’t good enough. It didn’t seem like enough passion was being released. When Natalie Portman kisses Mila in Black Swan. That is how you fucking shoot a kissing scene. It seems like sonic boom is happening.

-Collin