17 thoughts on “The New Little Women (2017)

  1. I saw it also. Felt it was really rushed in the last episode. No character development for Professor Bhaer at all.

    1. To be fair, the character of Bhear hardly gets developement in the book. :)

  2. Pretty sure it’s three episodes for PBS, not two. It definitely is three on my Passport subscription – I’ve watched them all already.

  3. I wish I was able read the entire review as I have also written one on my blog and wanted to know others’ opinions. I guess I’ll wait for it to be available.

    ~ Megan Joy

  4. I really enjoyed the miniseries overall – Maya Hawke may be my favorite of all Jo Marches. But I’m annoyed and have been at every version of this that whoever plays Professor Bhaer is not German (in this case, actor Mark Stanley), and has little to no chemistry with the actress portraying Jo. This is true throughout the history of Little Women adaptations. I’m very grateful for the lived-in, true-to-period feel of this version, and I generally love the casting, it’s just this thing that gets me every time.

    1. In a lot of ways, adding Professor Bhaer was kind of Alcott’s fuck-you to the fans of the series who wanted Jo to marry Laurie. She purposefully didn’t want a typical, predictable happy ending for Jo. So Bhaer & Jo don’t make a ton of sense in the book, imo, & it’s always hard to translate that to screen in any version.

  5. I enjoyed this version as well. The clothes evoked the feeling of being homemade, mended and possibly even hand me downs. I loved the movie, but felt the Marches there were better off at times. The new version felt better somehow. Dr March might have come from money, but his religious views might have separated him from this.
    I had the same problem with the actress, Kathryn Newton, playing Beth, she never really looked under 17 or so.

    And Laurie at times creeped me out. Didn’t want to take no for an answer, really spoiled, stalkerish.

  6. I feel like I need to reread the book, as I read it so long ago. I only watched the first episode, although I think it’s on prime now, so I could see the others. I thought some things were very well done, but it felt soooo episodic, more like a series of vignettes than one story throughout. I wasn’t happy with Amy either, not the actress fault but she’s not believable as 12, and having her be older and burning Jo’s manuscript page by page just made her seem indescribably cruel rather than someone acting out in anger. It was beautiful to look at, however, and I thought some creativity, like showing Beth’s “shyness” as anxiety was precisely the right way to use modern insights on a classic novel (I’m still glaring at Anne with an E for its victorian child abuse porn vibe).

  7. I think what some people feel is that Ryder doesn’t have Jo’s physicality as described in the book. She’s too pretty and fine to be tall, gawky Jo. But I have to admit I did enjoy that movie.

    1. I agree. It’s not Winona’s fault but she is much too conventionally beautiful to be Jo March.

  8. It says something about me that I can still vividly recall the dress descriptions in Little Women and see that they weren’t followed. Meg’s original ball gown was a white tarlatan and the dress she was given China blue silk.
    And Amy is supposed to have curls!

    1. Oh, yes, I remember all their dresses; I was yet another of the millions of girls who read L.W. over and over. This version is very fine–apart from the fact that Amy, as always, looks like she should be hanging out at the mall–but I still prefer 1994, if only because Gabriel Byrne actually makes an attractive Bhaer, and I like Gillian Armstrong’s direction of anything. It’s just hard to film stories that span more than five years; you have to either cast two performers per part, or accept that they’re all going to look too mature to play teenagers (although Maya Hawke manages this very well).

  9. I remember as a mid century suburban girl being mightily puzzled by aspects of Little Women. Why was it bad that Meg and Jo had jobs? How could the Marches be so poor if they have a maid? But the biggest mystery of all was what did it mean that Meg found her new dress wouldn’t wash after ‘cutting the breadths’?? I looked up breadths but it didn’t help.
    Maturity and familiarity with 19th century conventions explained a great deal but I can still recall the jolt of realization when I discovered that 19th c. dresses were sold as material and a pattern. Suddenly the cutting out made sense!

  10. I really liked Maya Hawke as Jo. As much as I love Wynona Ryder (and i think she’s amazing), I felt she was too conventionally pretty, and not nearly awkward enough to play Jo.
    I agree that Amy looked much older than twelve in the beginning, but i’m willing to give it a pass, because the only other option would have been to cast two separate actresses (something they probably didn’t want to do for a main character in a three-hour miniseries).

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