Pride & Prejudice (2005)

MIMDB score: 7.8
Current IMDB score: 7.8
Director: Joe Wright
Main Actors you care about: Keira Knightly, Rosamund Pike, Jena Malone, Carey Mulligan, Donald Sutherland, Matthew Macfadyen

Why I liked it:
One of the few movies I could watch on repeat.  I would love to say this is higher than a 7.8 but I can't do it.  I don't think everyone lives in a world where love is the most important thing in life.  If you don't find stories of the agony of falling in love insanely interesting then you'll find this movie boring.  If you do find love insanely interesting then you'll find this this movie fantastic.  The book is one of the best books written about the loveliness of falling in love. This version of the movie is in my opinion the best version.

What stands out: It's beautiful.  The music is perfect.  The scenes are spectacular.  The acting is spectacular.  The cast was fantastic.  It is so very good.

I can not stress enough that I love the witty banter between Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth.  That might be my favorite part of love.  It's well done in this movie and makes me smile every time it happens in the movie.

What I Would Change (if anything): Sorry, I can't think of anything.  It's so very meaningful.  It makes me feel so good just watching the opening credits.

Favorite Line(s)/Scene:
Hmmmm, where to begin.  I want to watch the first proposal scene over and over.  It's so wonderful.  That's where I'd like to propose if I ever propose to someone and it was up to me where it happened.  I know Elizabeth said no there but doesn't matter because the setting is so amazing.  The second proposal scene is just a regular scene for me.  It's nice and all and the lighting is fantastic and his words are fantastic but it doesn't have the extreme emotion that's in the first proposal.

The dance scene where everyone else fades away and it's just Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth.  I think that's been done before even in dancing scenes but it was the first time I saw it in a movie and it added to the scene a lot.  Reminds of The Fountain scene where he is walking down the street and doesn't hear anything besides his own footsteps.  The moments when everything else fads away and it's just you and maybe one other person are what life is about I feel like.

There is a tracking scene at a dance where Wickham is suppose to show up.  It's just one camera shot the whole time and you see what everyone is doing.  I really like that way shooting in general.  Especially when you have to show a lot of what people are doing in one scene.  This movie does that well.  There always seems to be a few things going on in one scene like this that you have to pay attention more than you would a normal scene.

Mr. Darcy: "I... do not have the talent of conversing easily with people I have never met before."
Elizabeth Bennet: "Perhaps you should take your aunt's advice and practice?"
One of my more favorite witty banter between the two.  I don't have the talent of conversing easily with people in general.

Elizabeth Bennet: I'm very fond of walking.
Mr. Darcy: Yes . . . yes I know.
These aren't thought provoking but they make me happy when I think about them.  He's so in love when he says his line here.

Elizabeth Bennet: "Only the deepest love will persuade me into matrimony, which is why I will end up an old maid."  Same with me except an old bachelor?  What's a old bachelor called? An old bastard probably.

Charlotte Lucas: "Not all of us can afford to be romantic, Lizzy."
This line kills me.  I understand in the past that Charlotte wouldn't have the ability to refuse a man per say but today I would hope no one would settle.  Settling is a hard thing to understand.  Do people know they are settling?  Is settling the same as what other people think it is.  Is that a rule that everyone should abide by?  Anytime you get married you probably settling in some format.  No one is perfect.  No relationship is perfect.  No two people line up like soul mates or whatever. Also your life isn't over until it's over.  You will not meet everyone you are going to meet till the end of your life.  You could meet someone better.  You don't know.  Because of that marriage is settling.  Marriage is not a terrible thing though.  How could settling be a terrible thing then?

Settling is just a mentality.  It's challenging to think about whether some one else is really settling or just looks like it.  I think with yourself that it's easy to feel if you are settling.  Therefore I trust people are not actually settling.  They could be settling in love because they want something else in life more.  For instance some people want kids more than they want love of a husband or wife.  Settling in love has to be okay because of that line of thought.  I just don't see myself settling in love.

Charlotte Lucas: "We are all fools in love."  Amen Charlotte.  I might even extend it to "We are all fools in life".  I haven't met anyone who knows what they were doing in life, let alone love.  People just get lucky and some people don't in life (and love).

Similar Movies/TV Shows: All the other Pride and Prejudice versions and remakes.  None of them are as good as this one though in my opinion.  Bronte sister movies: Jane Eyre (2006 version is best), Wuthering Heights.  Jane Austin's other novels that are decent movies: Persuasion, Sense and Sensibility, Emma, Mansfield Park.  Downtown Abbey probably.  None of these are as lovely as this version of Pride and Prejudice though.

"Side" note:  I think it's subtle in the movie but the youngest (Mary Bennet) is in love with Mr. Collins.  I didn't pick that up till I listened to the commentary.  They don't even mentioned it in this diagram.