Love & Friendship

2016

Action / Comedy / Drama / Romance

84
Rotten Tomatoes Critics - Rotten 59% · 218 reviews
Rotten Tomatoes Audience - Spilled 59% · 10K ratings
IMDb Rating 6.4/10 10 27556 27.6K

friendship based on novel or book 18th century

Plot summary

From Jane Austen’s novella, the beautiful and cunning Lady Susan Vernon visits the estate of her in-laws to wait out colorful rumors of her dalliances and to find husbands for herself and her daughter. Two young men, handsome Reginald DeCourcy and wealthy Sir James Martin, severely complicate her plans.

Director

Whit Stillman Photo
Whit Stillman

Top cast

Kate Beckinsale Photo
Kate Beckinsale as Lady Susan Vernon
Justin Edwards Photo
Justin Edwards as Charles Vernon
Xavier Samuel Photo
Xavier Samuel as Reginald DeCourcy
Chloë Sevigny Photo
Chloë Sevigny as Alicia Johnson
720p.BluRay 1080p.BluRay
682.96 MB
1280*682
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
23.976 fps
1 hr 30 min
Seeds 1
1.42 GB
1920*1024
English 2.0
NR
Subtitles us  
23.976 fps
1 hr 30 min
Seeds 14

Movie Reviews

Reviewed by richardchatten 7 / 10

The Mien Engaging

Kate Beckinsale trades in her latex for hats and crinolines to take on Jane Austen in this moderately tongue-in-cheek adaptation of her posthumously-published novella in which pert modern misses Beckinsale & Sevigny dress up in a succession of magnificent period creations and sit about talking (and talking) about, well, love and friendship rather as Whit Stillman's characters used to do in twentieth century Manhattan.It's all agreeable and good-looking, although the settings feel totally unlived in and everybody sounds as if they're simply reciting dialogue they've memorised in advance. Which of course they have.
Reviewed by evanston_dad 6 / 10

Tone Deaf Austen Adaptation

Something is tonally off about "Love & Friendship," Whit Stillman's screen adaptation of a Jane Austen novella. Stillman treats the film like a satire of Jane Austen, with all of the actors moving through the film practically winking at the camera to acknowledge they're playing dress up. The problem with that approach is that Austen was already a crack satirist herself. Therefore, the film doubles the emotional distance between the audience and the characters, so we have a hard time caring much about what happens to any of them. Another big problem is the casting. Kate Beckinsale is a lovely actress, and she does imperious and haughty well. But her character is in virtually every scene, and she's supposed to be so irresistible that she can manipulate anyone to do anything she wants. Beckinsale doesn't have that kind of allure; she's technically proficient at hitting her marks, but she doesn't have the screen presence to carry this really rather despicable character off. I'm stumped to think of a modern-day actress who could, but Vivien Leigh would have been perfect in a role like this. The poor casting extends to other members of the cast as well, most egregiously to Chloe Sevigny, who is far too contemporary an actress to be believable in a period piece. Most everyone else in the film is a drip, with the sole exception of Tom Bennett, who plays a bumbling suitor brilliantly and enlivens the picture every time he's on screen. Would that the whole film had been as funny and engaging as his performance.With Stillman maintaining too much of an ironical distance from the action, the film turns into a talky succession of drawing rooms conversations that don't amount to much of anything save a procession of pretty period gowns.Grade: B-
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