Great Expectations that promptly fell flat...

I love a costume drama. Pretty much any costume drama. In fact, I'm not the person who says, "Only the Colin Firth Mr. Darcy" is relevant. Even though, I love the 1995 version of Pride and Prejudice more than any other, I want them to make more Austen. (As long as it doesn't have Keira Knightley in it.)

I love a good remake and I always get excited to see a new version of my favorite classics. I loved the latest version of "Far from the Madding Crowd." It was excellent. Bathsheba is one of my favorite characters. If you don't know the story, she's basically a female version of the prodigal son. But here's the thing, the audience doesn't care for a female prodigal so it's not a well-loved story.  And I think it should be. Such a great story and not nearly as depressing as most Thomas Hardy novels.
But let's talk Dickens. Dickens is such an amazing storyteller. To this day, the description of Scrooge as a character is one of my favorite paragraphs in all of literature: 

"Oh! But he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! a squeezing, wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous, old sinner! Hard and sharp as flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire; secret, and self-contained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features, nipped his pointed nose, shriveled his cheek, stiffened his gait; made his eyes red, his thin lips blue; and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime was on his head, and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his low temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the dog-days; and didn't thaw it one degree at Christmas." 

 

In other words, Dickens knew how to create a character. His settings are so genuine that "Dickensian" is actually an adjective in the dictionary.  But the director of the new "Great Expectations" seems to have forgotten this in their latest rendition. The powers that be thought they could improve on a story that has been around since 1861. As with all things done with hubris, it's terrible. Not just terrible. Hard to follow. Makes no sense and the characters are absolutely HATEFUL.

 

Yes, Miss Havisham should be unlikable. She is, in fact, the villain. But in this version, even Pip is a villain. In the original story, Pip looks up to his brother-in-law and wants to be a blacksmith just like Joe.  In this version, Pip goes to the great house and suddenly wants to be a great gentleman--throwing away the one good relationship he has in life. It's so incredibly unbelievable and doesn't work at all because why would you want to aspire to be a crazy old lazy who lives in squalor?  I can't root for Pip when I want to slap some sense into him.

 

The actress they got to play Estella is lacking the charm needed for that role and as a couple, they have literally no chemistry.  I don't know why this version makes me so mad, but I think it's the insane narcissism to think you can improve upon Dickens' characters and motivations. Get over yourself. Okay, I'm done ranting now. You should probably skip this one and go find an older version. Any older version. Maybe if I came into this clean, not knowing the story...nope. I don't think even then.