If you’ve found yourself all swept up by the new Georgia Oakley-directed, Daisy Edgar-Jones-led Sense and Sensibility – heartbroken and then lovestruck, bereft and then revived – then you’ll surely be on the hunt for more swoon-worthy period dramas to sustain you as soon as you leave the cinema. Here are the six classics to stream next, from other sumptuous Jane Austen adaptations to a sapphic epic and a verified ’90s classic.
Sense and Sensibility
For those already familiar with Ang Lee’s exquisite take on the same novel, you’ll likely already be thinking about this rain-soaked, heart-rending 1995 adaptation as you watch the latest retelling – you’ll picture Kate Winslet as Marianne Dashwood, anguished at the rejection of Greg Wise’s Willoughby, as Esmé Creed-Miles and Frank Dillane act out the same scene; or Emma Thompson as the older sister, Elinor, unable to express her true feelings to Hugh Grant’s Edward Ferrars, as Edgar-Jones and George MacKay take centre stage. If you, for some reason, haven’t seen it, though, I urge you to correct that right away. The supporting cast is ridiculously stacked – Harriet Walter as the horrible Fanny Dashwood, Hugh Laurie as the disinterested Mr Palmer, Alan Rickman as the brooding Colonel Brandon – and the script so sparkling that it earned Thompson a Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar. It’s less earthy and elemental than the new Sense and Sensibility, to be sure, but remains an unassailable classic in its own right.
The last big-screen rendering of Sense and Sensibility aside, the Austen adaptation that most closely mirrors the spirit of this new period drama is Joe Wright’s 2005 Pride and Prejudice. Unlike Dakota Johnson’s heightened, -esque or Anya Taylor-Joy’s frothy, ice cream-hued , this is a looser, more naturalistic take on the literary classic, with a string of wonderful performances: Keira Knightley as a sharp-tongued Elizabeth Bennet, Matthew Macfadyen as a frosty Mr Darcy, Rosamund Pike as a luminous Jane, Kelly Reilly as an imperious Caroline Bingley, Tom Hollander as an almost tragic Mr Collins, Judi Dench as a terrifying Lady Catherine de Bourgh, Rupert Friend as an irresistible Wickham and Brenda Blethyn as the hilariously desperate Mrs Bennet. Add the intricate costumes, lush landscapes, tinkling piano and simmering sexual tension, and you have a ravishing romance that is simply a delight from start to finish.
The Age of Innocence
For another painfully intimate study of repressed desire in the vein of Elinor and Edward, look no further than Martin Scorsese’s Academy Award-winning 1993 reimagining of Edith Wharton’s glorious 1920 novel. A sideburn-sporting, top-hatted Daniel Day-Lewis is the dutiful Newland Archer, torn between his desire for the free-thinking Countess Ellen Olenska (a stunning Michelle Pfeiffer) and his promise to his betrothed, the young but wily May Welland (a radiant Winona Ryder). It’s a gorgeous rendering of 1870s New York high society, with the lavish interiors and extraordinary costumes to match, but it’s the characters’ humanity – their passions, regrets and heartache – that remain at the forefront throughout.
Portrait of a Lady on Fire
An instant queer classic. Céline Sciamma’s sweeping 2019 tale of an 18th-century painter (Noémie Merlant) who falls for the convent girl and soon-to-be wife of a Milanese nobleman (Adèle Haenel) she has been commissioned to draw is, naturally, full of unforgettable images: the beaches, coves and crashing waves of the remote island in Brittany where this love story unfolds, the two women in bed closely observing one another, and the vision of flames on the edges of a billowing skirt which gives this masterful period piece its title. Sense and Sensibility similarly centres the female gaze and connects its heroines to their unforgiving, windswept and, ultimately, magical landscape.
The opening shots of the new Sense and Sensibility – in which Marianne lays in the long grass, lost in thought – seem to nod to the lyrical, quietly observant work of Andrea Arnold, specifically her 2011 version of Emily Brontë’s blustery tragedy. It is about as far from Emerald Fennel’s Day-Glo interpretation of the book as it’s possible to get, casting Kaya Scodelario as the conflicted Catherine Earnshaw and James Howson as the steely Heathcliff, the latter the first Black actor to play the Byronic anti-hero on the big screen. There’s a stark rawness and brutality to their turbulent lives, but immense beauty, too, in the misty moors and a lifelong connection which can’t even be severed by death.
Does Sofia Coppola’s transfixing 1999 feature debut qualify as a period drama? Well, it’s set in the ’70s, so I’d appreciate if you indulged me here. The new Sense and Sensibility’s Marianne, in many ways, feels like the lost sixth Lisbon sister – rebellious and almost feral, always running through the fields, her hair wet and bedraggled, and daydreaming about a life beyond her grasp. Thanks to its unparalleled ensemble (Kirsten Dunst, AJ Cook, Hanna R Hall, Leslie Hayman and Chelse Swain), sun-drenched cinematography and incredibly detailed world-building, it is still one of the most influential movies of its era.