Emma is a spoiled little rich girl living a parochial existence in a rural backwater where she leads society, such as it is - according to Jane Austen's text.
She is bored but insufficiently educated or naturally intelligent to find something useful to do, so meddles rather dangerously in peoples' lives.
The film takes this unpromising material and makes a true comedy from it - the italianate 18th C style operatic music underlining her walk down the corridor telling you right from the start that this is an artifice, a game, an entertainment - And I was very entertained.
Anya Taylor-Joy has the perfect little "cat that got the cream" face and Johnny Flynn's Queen Bee song over the end credits tells us that she has has indeed got all the cream to be had.
The Gypsy Rose Lee reversé that Johnny Flynn undertakes is amusing. Never has a male leg looked so seductive with a stocking being drawn up it.
Another enjoyable moment was the introduction of Mrs Elton dressed as a wasp and (gasp) occupying the front pew. Incidentally Mr Knightley seems to spare himself church-going duties - one of those new-fangled deists perhaps?
Read this film as an ironic divertisement - a confection for your pleasure.
Review of Emma.
