We Just Watched… Little Women (2019)

Little Women, directed by Greta Gerwig (Ladybird), is a film adaptation of the book by Louisa May Alcott. The film has a star-studded cast of long-time gems and rising stars, including Saoirse Ronan (Ladybird), Emma Watson (Harry Potter), Florence Pugh (Midsommar) Eliza Scanlen (Sharp Objects), Laura Dern (Jurassic Park), Timothée Chalamet (Interstellar), Bob Odenkirk (Better Call Sall) and Meryl Streep (Mammia Mia!). If that isn’t enough to tempt you, then I don’t know what is!

Becca says: I’m not really the target audience for the Downton Abbey-style advertisements that every drama set in any pre-modern era must now be accompanied, but I do enjoy a good tale. I also haven’t read the books (I always had a copy as a child, but never had the time to pick it up), but this film makes me wish I had. The characters are very real and warm – spending extra money on such good actresses definitely paid off – and it makes an only child like me wonder what it may have been like to have sisters. Then they start to bicker and ruin each others things, and I’m thinking maybe it was best to have been alone. 

Either way, it was a pretty little story, with a little sad, a little happy, and a little bow of a message to tie it altogether. A perfect weird-bit-between-Christmas-and-New-Year present.

Jack says: I’d heard very, very good things about this film from critics I admire, so I was going in with pretty lofty expectations. And they were 100% correct because I adored this film. Everything about it is so meticulously detailed and perfect, from the performances to the set dressing, from the score to the screenplay.

It’s gorgeous to look at – with every scene having a painterly glow that makes you want to dive headfirst into the screen like Danny in ‘Last Action Hero’. I want to spend Christmas in New England. I want to write my magnum opus in the attic with a quill and ink by candlelight. I want to run through the streets of New York to sell my novel, or paint amidst lush gardens in Paris. It all sounds quaint, but the screenplay by Gerwig gives the whole thing a modern, feminist edge that always feels welcome and well deserved. 

It’s funny, it’s sad, but mainly it’s just really, really nice. And as this festive season draws to a close, I’m not sure you could ask for anything better.

Little Women is in cinemas now. We both heartily recommend it.