New Mansfield Park Surprisingly Racy

Innuendo, Wit and Blatant Sexuality Abound in Patricia Rozema's Austen Adaptation

I hate to do this to you, but... Imagine your parents having sex. Worse yet, your grandparents. I know, it's awful, one of those things that couldn't have been--but we all know it happened. The idea crashes through the barrier of your typical illusions of parents/grandparents--sterile virgins who exist only in the context of...well, you. Breaking down these types of barriers is exactly what director Patricia Rozema attempts to do in her rather unorthodox adaptation of Jane Austen's Mansfield Park. Indeed, Rozema crashes through the "garden party" of archetypal Austen movies (think Emma Thompson and Kate Winslett running breathless over the moor in Sense and Sensibility) to present a more richly satirical piece full of innuendo, witticism, and blatant sexuality. Yes, you heard right: sex in a Jane Austen movie.

Rozema's adaptation centers around her attempt to bring Jane Austen herself into the story through the character of Fanny Price (Frances O'Connor), our heroine. Rescued as a girl from her family's poverty by a wealthy uncle, Fanny moves to Mansfield Park, where she lives as a quasi-servant--constantly aware of her secondary status--for the duration of the story. In the novel, Fanny is quaintly moral, and pretty much chock-full of sugar and spice and everything nice. But Rozema has taken Fanny to new heights by giving her a boldness and sauciness which the director seems to fashion after Jane Austen herself--Austen in all her fierce humanity, her devastating wit, and her deep-seated belief in the power of love between two people.

Extending this sort of brash independence and playful wickedness to the rest of the film, Rozema has departed quite a bit from the subdued, "pretty" tone taken by other Austen filmmakers.And in losing this, she's brought social criticism to the fore. The film practically drips with satire--but it's a satire that's not entirely Austen. Of course, the story itself mocks many of the mores of the society Austen depicts, and the movie, accordingly, is not without some excellent moments (Harold Pinter makes an excellent pre-Victorian patriarch, dropping proper ultimatums right and left). But the new Mansfield Park, Rozema-style, takes the satire to a new level, mocking an entire era and bringing to the surface its deficiencies and ridiculousness. The criticism of the Antiguan slave trade in particular, less prominent in the novel, is quite visually brought to life in the film. By attempting to bring Austen herself into the movie and by transforming Austen's (questionable) implications into blatant innuendos, the director manages to make Jane Austen--well, raucous.

It's in that raucous spirit that we see a series of modifications: The Crawfords, Austen's villains, are noticeably less distasteful and quite unabashedly sexual; in general, characters are more unguardedly flirtatious, witticisms a little sharper, plot changes less subtle; and crowning it all is the "sex scene". The infidelity discovered via implication in a letter in Austens novel becomes a visual, shocking debacle in the film, quite in character with the brash nature of the adaptation. Amazingly, the director has planned her story in a way that makes this acceptable by keeping with her more open, admittedly "extreme" tone throughout the movie, Rozema has us prepped for what would be the unthinkable--a sex scene (gasp!) in Mansfield Park.

By the end of the film, we're ready for the traditional, Austenian happy ending. Rozema has made us want it by putting us through a more turbid, uninhibited version of what is coldly reserved from the novel. Rozema has said that she thinks of Fanny Price as a "test" created by Austen to experiment with the reactions of those around her. Certainly Rozema has made Fanny and Mansfield itself into a test of her own. But can America handle Austen with a little modern spice?