Greta Gerwig
Piccole donne

Round, warm, flows clear without much trouble, without tearing. Feminist comfort zone, I would call it, with no polemic intent. Many good actresses, nice clothes, and a lively pace, it works mainly as bittersweet entertainment. I don't see great contemporary leverage, it doesn't seem to speak much to the present. It's a timeless fairy tale in some aspects, and has run its course in others. That's fine, but let's not overburden it.

I haven't read the book, I vaguely remember the film with Winona Ryder, but I can imagine that the choice to juxtapose the two timelines (events from 1861 and 1968 alternate swiftly) is due to the necessity of altering the formula, given the umpteenth reprise. It partly works, because it allows us to illuminate many issues easily (perhaps too easily): we see premises and outcomes side by side, girls' dreams and women's realities compared up close, and they reveal how tough (up to a point, the poor are others) real life is compared to the dreamed one.

It's a choice made specifically for an audience that already knows the story and doesn't want to hear it repeated in the usual way. Otherwise, for a novice, the transitions sometimes are too dense, and the sense of change over the seven years is almost lost, because episodes are grouped by thematic areas and thus almost a circular view of time emerges, everything changes but nothing changes in the hearts of the little women. Which is a merit, if we will.

But the stories and characters of the four sisters aren't enough; after all, their stories are simple, there isn't much to say, especially considering the not-so-exceptional psychological depth. Therefore, everything else needs to be invigorated, a large colorful rim for an appropriately tasty dish. So, many ensemble scenes, much aesthetics, many narrative underlinings to create problematic knots. The father at war, the aunt, the squabbles, the poor. Many non-essential trappings that help nonetheless. It's a buffet of topics that doesn't tire.

I understand why the film received such positive reviews, it refreshes something widely known. The risk is to fray too much the continuity of events, or to induce confusion with certain transitions. But Gerwig is right to take that risk, it wouldn't have made much sense otherwise. The imperfections are an inevitable consequence, many side issues are stretched by this atypical progression.

The relationships between characters are, for example, a bit muddled, precisely because of this dual time division. It's an ambitious challenge to keep the episodes that happen at the beginning for the end, for the pleasure of immediately showing the negative or problematic twist seven years later. It works so-so, it's not entirely convincing, and all in all - considering the film's length - one could have expected more care even for the non-main sisters.

No matter, there's so much charisma in the faces of Ronan (exceptional, in my opinion) and Dern that almost just that would make a good film. But then there's also Pugh who is good, and Desplat's music accompanies pleasantly. Chalamet plays his usual character and obviously it works. Meryl is impeccable even if I didn't much like the figure of the aunt. Almost ridiculous in her retrograde vision.

So, it's not the great film that criticism is probably selling around. It's imperfect, clever, but also full of talent, in front and behind the camera.