About ten years late to the party, I watched the Keri Russell film Austenland (2013) about an American woman who goes to England to participate in a Jane Austen LARP at an English manor, only to discover that she bought the basic package, which is a lot less fun than the top end package which her two co-LARPers bought. I’d avoided the film for years due to bad reviews, and then on watching it decided I rather liked it. (This, too, is the story of Pride and Prejudice 1980).

I’m not sure if I can recommend it to other people. The slapsticky, PG-13 comedy at the surface is rather dull – lame gags about women talking/acting bawdy and men being either uncomfortable with it or encouraging – but the core romance track is sound and there are some interesting in-jokes and subtexts that the reviews seemed to overlook (or not talk about). I thought I would summarize them here. Warning: spoilers below, including for a core plot twist from late in the film…

-First off, we have the stunt-casting:

–James Callis (Colonel Andrews) played a supporting character in Bridget Jones’ Diary. Rupert Vanisttart (Mr. Wattlesbrook) played Mr Hurst in the 1995 Pride and Prejudice. (Memo to reviewers: there is absolutely no indication in the novel or the 1995 version that Mr Hurst is at all lecherous or improper to women, so please stop saying that Vanisttart is playing the exact same character in both.)

–JJ Feild (Henry Nobley) played Henry Tilney in the 2007 Northanger Abbey – the only man capable of making me fall for that particular Austen hero. West Wycombe Park (the main manor house) supposedly appears in the 2008 Sense and Sensibility, and was definitely built by Sir Francis Dashwood, whose surname might seem familiar to Jane Austen fans.

–Bret McKenzie (Martin) had background Elf roles in Peter Jackson’s LOTR and Hobbit, and there’s a reference to that towards the end of the movie. Ricky Whittle (Captain George East) really was a soap opera star, just as his character is said to be.

-“I have no idea what James Callis is trying to do here” said several reviews by people who are apparently unfamiliar with the comedian he is imitating in this film, the late Terry-Thomas. Colonel Andrews’ military profession seems to be mostly a nod to Colonel Fitzwilliam from P&P; someone must have done comparatively a lot of homework to realize that Fitzwilliam is the more ornamental sort of military officer, not a hardened war veteran.

-At the start of the story, Keri Russell’s character, Jane Hayes, is a person of excessive sensibility, being counseled by a more grounded friend (Ayda Field) who has a sisterly demeanor. Here, she is Marianne to the friend’s Elinor.

-The LARP organizer/Dungeon Master/whatever is Mrs Wattlesbrook (Jane Seymour), basically a modern-day Lady Catherine De Bourg, complete with meddling tendencies: she’s the one setting up the fantasy romances between the guests and the actors.

-Jane meets a richer fellow American (Jennifer Coolidge) named Elizabeth (called Lizzie once) attending the same LARP. Inspite of the naming convention, Elizabeth is more the Mrs. Jennings to Jane’s Marianne, and the Charlotte Palmer to Colonel Andrews’ Mr Palmer.

-There’s a third guest in their group, Amelia (Georgia King). Amelia is at different times positioned as kind of the Emma of the group – high status, competent at Regency larping (we eventually learn that she is a repeat visitor), unthinkingly cruel, but not malicious – and the Mary Crawford – helpful to the heroine but not necessarily for disinterested reasons. Then we find out that the story she’s evolving for herself in Austenland casts her as Anne Elliott (with Captain East as her Wentworth), but in real life, she’s Maria Rushworth. Hoo boy.

-The “spooky tower” where Jane is supposedly lodged is the only direct Northanger Abbey reference, other than JJ Feild’s presence. And Jane’s naivete. And the general discourse about blurring fact and fiction.

-She gets off on a bad foot with Nobley, and he with her. References to “First Impressions,” the original title of P&P get thrown around.

-The scene where Nobley rescues Jane from a storm by carrying her in front of him on a great black horse seems to be based on Colonel Brandon’s rescue of Marianne in 2008 Sense and Sensibility, which is an elaboration of a scene found in the 1995 version and also in the 2000 Tamil language adaptation, Kondukondain. The Austenland scene offers our first real clue about both Martin’s and Nobley’s positions in both the LARP and the main romantic triangle.

-The backstory Jane is assigned casts her as a poor relation in the style of Jane Fairfax from Emma or Fanny Price. Like Miss Fairfax, she has a romance with a fun-guy type that has to be kept secret because of differences in their status, although it’s with the stableboy Martin instead of Frank Churchill, heir to wealth. Like Fanny, she has to choose between an extroverted brunet fun-guy (Martin) and an earnest fair-haired bookworm (Nobley). As with Fanny, there are debates in some circles (by which I mean Figwit/Lindir fan circles) about whether she made the right choice.

-There are amateur theatricals (shades of Mansfield Park), during which the main couples become closer, and we get the first clue to Amelia’s more Maria Bertram/Rushworth tendencies. Jane’s friend Elizabeth gets to use a bow and arrow and injures someone, in an apparent nod to “please don’t shoot my dogs” from the Gwyneth Paltrow Emma, and its inspiration from the 1940 P&P.

-Nobley declares his love to Jane, she suddenly finds herself disgusted with all this make-believe, runs off to hang with Martin, then later discovers that Martin was her assigned LARPing love interest all along. Then she discovers that Nobley was not a professional actor, just a relative Mrs Wattlesbrook brought in as filler, and he really is in love with her. Basically, we and she suddenly realize that Martin is Willoughby/Wickham (albeit a more benign version), and Nobley is Brandon/Darcy. Well, we realize it before she does, because it’s a lot to process, but she comes around.

-And there are fisticuffs between her two love interests, as in Bridget Jones’ Diary.