Like a warm, buttery holiday meal, Greta Gerwig’s Little Women is, above all else, comfortable and indulgent. It is at times eye-rollingly earnest and Gerwig’s back-and-forth approach to the story’s timeline isn’t always successful. But the cinematography and costumes are stunning, like paintings come to life, and the piano-laden score is lovely and contemplative. Best of all, the film is an acting masterclass, with stellar turns by every key cast member.
Little Women has rather famously been adapted multiple times for both large and small screens. In fact, an Indian web series and a feature film adaptation (unrelated to one another) were both released in 2018. Gerwig’s version is the eighth film adaptation of Louisa May Alcott’s 1868 novel. It’s tempting to ask whether or not a new version is justified, but the answer to that question is: of course. In this age of countless sequels and derivative spinoffs, copycats and interpretations, who is to say what kind of film a successful filmmaker should get to make? The wild success of Gerwig’s 2017 hit Lady Bird allowed her to make a passion project, and thus this Little Women was born.
The story follows the four Marsh sisters who live in Massachusetts with their mother, Marmee (Laura Dern), while their father is fighting in the Civil War. Outgoing Jo (Saoirse Ronan), sensible Meg (Emma Watson), dramatic Amy (Florence Pugh) and innocent Beth (Eliza Scanlen) are as close as sisters can possibly be, and the film chronicles their misadventures, many of which involve being romanced by a number of suitors, most notably their neighbor Mr. Laurence (Chris Cooper)’s grandson Laurie (Timothée Chalamet). Gerwig’s version of this tale differs in that it begins seven years in the future and hops back to many of the events of the novel. This future finds Jo making a living as a writer in New York, Meg trapped in an impoverished marriage, Amy on a European journey with Aunt March (Meryl Streep) and Beth bedridden because of a long-term illness.
While the back-and-forth leads to some well-earned emotional moments in the later parts of the film, in the early going it is quite confusing, particularly as changing hairstyles seem to be the only strategy for denoting the seven-year gap between timelines. It’s often hard to tell whether we’re in the present or past, and harder still to tell which of the two timelines is supposed to be the present. Are we looking forward or back? It might sound trivial, but because of the confusion it is hard to feel as if there is anything at stake in the story. Many of the developments feel like forgone conclusions, even those that differ from the well-known events of the novel.
And yet, it’s still wonderful to spend time in nearly every scene. Ronan embodies Jo with so much energy that she’s impossible to look away from. Dern is the essence of warmth as Marmee, and she is an actress who can do more with a glance or smile than most of her peers can do with a monologue. It’s jarring to see Watson, who we’ve known as Hermione Granger since she was a little girl, taking on the role of the eldest, world-weary sister and doing it so well. It’s her best performance ever, as she shows a lived-in weariness that is both heartbreaking and authentic. Relative newcomer Scanlen is quite the find as young Beth, and her scenes with Cooper are particularly touching. The biggest surprise is Florence Pugh, whose had a banner year with excellent roles in Fighting with My Family and Midsommar. Here, she turns Amy – who is hated by many fans of the book and other adaptations – into the most relatable character in the film. We understand her frustration with playing second fiddle to Jo, and we see the hope in her younger version harden into caution in her older self. Pugh does so much work with her movement here that it is possible to know what Amy is feeling just by how she walks into a scene. It’s an incredible performance.
Little Women could have perhaps been a little bit more, but when taken for what it is it more than satisfies. It’s a warm and comforting in a time where warm and comforting cinema is needed yet somehow increasingly rare. Gerwig cements the talent she demonstrated in Lady Bird and shows that in addition to being an excellent technical filmmaker, she excels at choosing collaborators.
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