Jane Austen a gâché ma vie

"Nameless, unremembered, acts/Of kindness and of love." Wordsworth

Around Regency England Jane Austen began to rule romantic literature with her witty deconstruction of upper-class pretentions and wise advice about how to find love and/or fortune. With the 250th anniversary of her birth, the film Jane Austen Wrecked My Life is a low-key Austen modernization that depicts a young book seller, Agathe (Camille Rutherford), who can't break her writer's block or find love. Yet, she has a disposition given to "acts of kindness and love."

While she has a womanizing co-worker, Felix (Pablo Pauly), who apparently loves her, she won't give herself to him out of diffidence, good sense, and plain cluelessness. He signs her up for a Jane Austen Residency at a posh estate in Britain (all shot in France), where it looks like she will fail again to be inspired to write. It's not unknown that meeting new people, including seasoned writers, helps to mitigate the block and renew a zest for life; for Agathe, it will be a slow burn, her very name suggesting "a gate."

This lyrical French rom-com, with alternating subtitles, is a treat for a cool summer evening when you are ready to be seduced by French joie de vivre and an art film that uses no CGI, relies on insights about love and writing fitting to Austen herself, and sometimes dips into old-fashioned screwball comedy or plain old-fashioned pratfalls. A bit of vaudeville, I'd say, such as when she, naked, stumbles into the room of Oliver (Charlie Anson), a distant relative of Austen and for whom romance with Agathe has potential.

There's even a formal ball, in the Austen spirit, and Agathe shines like the actress Anne Hathaway, slender and charming. Emerging into a woman less like Austen's Emma and more like Elizabeth Bennet.

All in all, not much happens in Jane Austen Wrecked My Life but a tardy romance, just right for light, summer cinema and fitting for the immortal Jane Austen on her anniversary.

I had seen the trailer at least five times, so I knew what to expect when I snuck in for my third film of the day. This movie is a small gem, a European romantic comedy without Hugh Grant or Colin Firth. Agathe is stuck in a rut. Her parents died in a car accident with her in it. She now has a car phobia. She lives with her sister, who sleeps around and brings them home. She has a platonic relationship with her Paris bookshop Shakespeare and Company coworker Felix. They end up kissing on the dock after he secretly enters her for a Jane Austen writing residency in England. This is somehow the same plot device contained in Broadway's one woman show, Call Me Izzy. JA's great great great grandson picks her up. She vomits all over him. Needless to say, they will fall in love and Agathe becomes suddenly embroiled in a romantic triangle. Camille Rutherford is unconventionally pretty and funny as the lead. Charlie Anson nicely handles his intellectual hunk Oliver assignment. Pablo Pauly is good as the Casanova coworker. Frederick Wiseman has a nice cameo as a poet at the end. It's just a sweet, pleasant and relaxing film to spend a hundred minutes with on a weekend. Writer and director Laura Piani has secured her artistic future. My audience and I were enthralled.

Although I was hopeful about this movie after watching the trailer, I went to the theater with not very high expectations but I am sad it still disappointed me.

I think the film's concept of writers going to a Jane Austen Residency was a great idea. However, the romance between Agathe and Oliver did not feel genuine or believable. The relationship between Agathe and Félix was just sad and there was no love there. The story had too many cliché components for me and it was too "modern" to be associated with Jane Austen. I found that none of the characters were inspiring. Agathe is very far from being a Jane Austen virtuous heroine. There were a few times that I genuinely laughed and will remember these so that is a positive. Sadly, I think one is better watching any other movie based on any Jane Austen book or even the film "Austenland" was way better than this one, and would watch instead of this one.

I thought this movie was alright. I wasn't expecting it to be primarily in French, but if that doesn't deter you, it's worth watching! I don't know if Charlie Anson has inquisitive eyes or creeper eyes, but he walks a fine line in this movie. The romance between his character, Oliver, and Agatha is kind underdeveloped. Throughout most of this movie, it just feels like something is missing. Nevertheless, an inquisitively eyed guy meets annoyed RBF woman and go! That's this movie, and it's alright, closer to being good than bad. This movie fits very well into itself, and I mean, you're expecting a fairy tale like romance to develop, but it can't because of the disposition and assumptions and chaos and trauma of Agatha, and you get that. I don't think you really feel what she's feeling, but you get it well enough to understand. This movie has the capacity to make you smile and laugh and feel contentment with its conclusion. I'd recommend a watch. Ideally, it's better suited for a streaming, date night kinda movie.

For me, one of the weaknesses of the film was that although most of it was set in England, it was all filmed in France. A French chateau does not look like an English country house, which gave it an artificial feeling.

It was OK, but didn't convince. Perhaps they tried to include too many story lines, such as a childhood trauma, complicated family, man with dementia, etc, which didn't add anything to the story. This left too little time for the romance to blossom realistically.