Fanny Price (Billie Piper) was taken from the poverty of her parents and sent to live with her more fortunate cousins at Mansfield Park. Her childhood was one of loneliness, her only companion is Edmund (Blake Ritson), one of her cousins. Who she feels highly of, in love and friendship. The departure from her parents scars her throughout her childhood and this connection towards Edmund only increases until she is old enough to understand that she is in love with him.
As they grow together new visitors cause problems which lead to affections being tormented and crushed. Mansfield Park is waiting for the arrival of new neighbours. Mary Crawford (Hayley Atwell) is a young, beautiful woman who is drawn to fashion and being the centre of attention in society. She takes a fancy to Edmund and he returns her affections but she teases and pushes him into giving up his life long ambition. Edmund is easily drawn into this woman's affections and feels that he cannot be without her. For Fanny this distresses her and she is constantly jealous and watching their every move. The other neighbour to cause discomfort toward the Mansfield household is a good looking gentleman called Henry Crawford (Joseph Beattie). He instantly starts to admire Fanny's eldest cousin, but due to her being engaged he moves his way quickly around all the other ladies of the household and ends up drawing his final affections on Fanny. She does not care for his charms and turns down his offer of marriage.
Fanny is left on her own to deal with her thoughts and actions, her family see this as her punishment for not accepting the offer of marriage. She spends the time thinking of Edmund and questioning her own abilities.
Of course Edmund and Fanny do give into each other and marry, well for Fanny at least. Edmund has a spark of a moment which allows him to see the beauty in Fanny and then he instantly fall in love with her. He confesses that he has been blind and has always loved her but never noticed it.
This production feels much longer than it actually is. We could imply that this is because we do not leave Mansfield park and we revolve around the character Fanny. We are left as prisoners with her in this huge house, with no manner of entertainment just her presence and thoughts. We witness other characters going outside the park and visiting society but us (the audience) we stay with the main character. This could suggest that this one of the reasons to why this production may feel slow. Another reason to why this maybe suggested is to do with the way that the romance evolves throughout this production. The other Jane Austen films (that I have viewed) all seem to allow the romance to blossom at the start in some shape or form. But with this particular film, there is love there but nothing really happens with it until 15 minuets from the end where it hit us. The romance in this film between the two main characters is very quick, once something happens there is flirting, dancing and seductive eye contact all within this small time limit. This is the main difference (that I have noticed) with this film compared to others. The romance in some of the other productions is spread across the duration of the film and toward the end of the film we get the impression that there will be a happy ending. This film plays with our expectations and we do wonder if the two lovers will get together.
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