REVIEW. JANE AUSTEN WRECKED MY LIFE. So what else is new?

The first film version of a Jane Austen novel was Pride and Prejudice back in 1940, starring Laurence Olivier and Greer Garson. Then nothing until 1995, when an "Austen Explosion" erupted: Kicking off what would become a cinematic outbreak for one of Britain's most beloved novelists was Emma Thompson's Academy Award winning (for Best Adapted Screenplay) Sense and Sensibility, which premiered in December. It was quickly followed by two versions of another Austen favorite, Emma and its modern counterpart,Clueless, both released in 1996. That same year, Helen Fielding's humorous, self-deprecating and wildly successful novel, Bridget Jones's Diary, about a thirty-something British woman looking for love, loosely based on Pride, was published. Its equally successful movie version, staring Renee Zellwegger, Colin Firth and Hugh Grant, was released five years later.

Of course, the one event that may have sparked this late 20th - early 21st century revival of Austen's novels is the moment that Colin Firth (as Austen's dashingly romantic hero, Fitzwilliam Darcy in the 1995 BBC mini-series, Episode 1, Scene 12) emerged from an impromptu dip in the lake with his wet clothes provocatively clinging to his handsome frame, bumping into future bride, Elizabeth Bennett (Jennifer Ehle), and igniting Darcymania in the process.

You can check it out here (if you don't already have it on your YouTube playlist):

https://youtu.be/hasKmDr1yrA?si=Sc7nFE4yVUSzugw_

Now referred to as "the scene that changed everything," director Andrew Davies explained the reason for what was considered a shocking departure from the environment and behavior found in Austen's novels:

We wanted lots of energy in the show, and the book justifies it, because

Elizabeth is always running about and going on long country walks

and getting all flushed and sweaty and getting the bottom of her petticoat

muddy, which seems to be quite a turn-on for Darcy. So we thought, let’s make

it as physical as we can without being ridiculous about it. Let’s remind the audience

that this isn’t just a social comedy – it’s about desire and young people

and their hormones – and let’s try to find ways of showing that as much as possible.

Sigh. Audiences swooned. Austen scholars and literature professors argued over this audaciously modern interpretation of Darcy as Elizabeth's objet de désir via the re-imagined encounter, my husband among the naysayers, who found the (in)famous scene the "only inauthentic note in the entire series." He reminded me that, in Jane Austen's novels, love matches weren't based on passion, they were based on respect. The titles of her novels alone suggest there was something more than sex driving her narratives. So the wet shirt scene, for him, was really about trying to connect to a modern audience focused more on the physical than the cerebral.

Suddenly, though, Austen's characters were hot, her stories oozing with understated sexual tension. Austen postumously spoke for passionate yearnings of women everywhere - those eager to assert themselves as a "strong female protagonist," those waiting to find their Mr. Darcy, and all those in between. Whatever drives the box office, yes? And I'll admit that I once told one of my film classes that I'd pay to watch Colin Firth read the phone directory, so the sex appeal thing worked, with or without the wet shirt.

Following that mid-90s surge, we were treated to such varying adaptations as Bride and Prejudice (2004, the Bollywood version), Material Girls (2006), The Jane Austen Book Club and Becoming Jane (2007), From Prada to Nada (2011), Austenland (2013), and finally ( but surely not final ) - Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (2016). And yes, you read the last title correctly.

And there's more! In addition to the more traditional adaptations of Austen's work, there have been countless TV and movie versions of her many novels, with Pride and Prejudice, Emma and Persuasian leading the most popular of her adaptations. That's more Austen than Mission: Impossible installments, so something about Austen must continue to resonate.

Am I a fan? Of Austen, yes.

Of the many traditional, sometimes quirky, sometimes clever iterations of her work? Mostly yes, though I must admit the Zombie thing didn't do much for my sensibilities. (You can groan now.)

Thus, it was with more than a bit of curiosity that I puchased tickets to see Jane Austen a gâché ma vie (translated: Jane Austen Wrecked My Life), writer-director Laura Piani's feature film debut and the latest form of contemporary romantic carnage attributed to Austen. The film premiered at last year's Toronto International Film Festival and was released in France earlier this year.

Piani's take on Austen centers on a French bookseller named Agathe (Camille Rutherford) who works at Shakespeare & Company and lives with her sister and nephew. Agathe bicycles everywhere: as the sole survivor of an automobile accident that killed both her parents, she fears cars and any modern mode of transportation. Agathe's only friend is Félix (Pablo Pauly), a co-worker at the bookstore and seeming nemisis to her sad and lonely bibliogrphile. She can easily connect any person or situation to a Jane Austen novel or character.

One night, dining alone at a Chinese restaurant, Agathe imagines the face of a man in her sake cup and begins to write the first chapters of a romance novel. When Félix happens upon it, it secretly sends the draft to the Jane Austen Residency, a two-week writers workshop held annually in England. When Agathe is accepted to the Residency, she realizes she must confront some of her fears in order to participate.

With Félix's encouragement, she reluctantly decides to attend, heading for England and sharing an unexpectedly passionate kiss with Félix when he drives her to the boat. Upon arrival, Agathe meets Oliver, the five-times great nephew of Jane Austen and a professor of contemporary literature at University. Oliver finds his distant relative's work "over-rated" and proceeds to spar with Agathe about the merits of Austen's legacy. Their bilingual sparring (Agathe's father was British; Oliver studied French), makes for some delightful linguistic foreplay early in their meeting.

Oliver shares that he is only helping with the Residency because he aging parents need some assistance. Oliver's mother Beth (a radiant Liz Crowther) provides the movie's gentle wisdom; his father Todd (Alan Fairbairn), who is in the early stages of dementia, offers some comic relief, though the third time he ran freely sans trousers started to wear thin.

The rest of the Residency participants are a fairly typical lot, arranged more to underscore differences in literary styles and writing philosophies than to develop more characters or relationships. Agathe and Oliver tap dance around simmering feelings, their interactions dodgy and clumsy, at times. Félix returns (of course), partly in response to Agathe's unrequited texts to him about that unlikely kiss they shared, but mostly to confirm what we already knew: that Agathe and Oliver (Piani's version of Mr. Darcy), are the real love match.

When Agathe decides to leave the Residency early, claiming writer's block, it is Oliver who reminds her, "Literature is like ivy, it lives among the ruins." Agathe realizes she must face her demons, her past sorrow, in order to find her voice. Will she? Will she and Oliver reunite?

Whether this is enough to entice you to see this latest spin on Austen is up to you, but I will say this: Laura Piani has filled her script and this story with enough Austen references and metaphors to satisfy diehard Austenites, her cinematography sumptuous in its pastoral incarnation of impressionist landscapes and romantic settings. Too, she keeps the story moving, the dialogue crisp, and does a fine job with a stellar cast that captures the spirit of Austen's observations on social class and cultural differences, while maintaining strong female protagonists whose personal flaws serve as the driving force to finding fulfillment.

At the end of the movie, when we return to Shakespeare & Company's weekly book reading, it's like revisiting a thousand movies before that we knew would lead to this moment, and I couldn't help but think of Woody Allen running through Manhattan to find Mariel Hemingway or Julie Delpy emerging from the dusty bookshelves in Before Sunset or Andie MacDowell appearing at Hugh Grant's nuptials in Four Weddings and a Funeral: we knew those moments were coming, and yet we wanted to stay and enjoy the ride. Such is the case with Jane Austen Wrecked My Life - it may not alter your notion of a happy ending, but I'll dare you to say it doesn't warm your heart and rekindle a sense of romance.

Twenty-five years ago, I was asked to give a luncheon lecture on film to a group of retired faculty at Case Western Reserve University (my doctoral alma mater). At lunch, I was seated next to a lovely retiree who had taught British literature. Jane Austen was her specialty. "Did you see Emma?" she inquired. I nodded. "The one with Gwenyth Paltrow?" I nodded again. "I thought Clueless was better. So much more to the point than that sappy novel."

I smiled and we chatted about Austen, her themes about society and gender roles. She was clearly an Austen scholar, but she also had a keen sense of the modern world and how/why Austen still holds relevancy. I still think of her every time I re-read Austen or see a movie based on Austen's novels. Like Cher in Clueless, Agathe must come to terms with all that swirls around her before she can understand who she is and what she wants.

Ultimately, though, I couldn't help but return to the idea of "respect" in an Austen love match, something clearly, if awkwardly expressed here between Oliver and Agathe. And I'm reminded of what my husband whispered to me as the credits rolled, "See? He respected her first. Just the way I felt about you. I respected you before I loved you." Guess you'll have to see the movie to find out about that connection.

If that isn't worthy of a sigh, I don't know what is.

Jane Austen Wrecked My Life is now in theaters and should be streaming later this year.