Brace yourself for the first great film of 2020, seven days after the season that celebrates the birth of Christ-possibly the most sublimely Christian film to start the new year. I’m talking pure, crystaline Christianity, the real thing, not the posturing, proselytising impostor of organised religion that evokes desultory derision of the devout because of the obvious declamatory hypocrisy.

LITTLE WOMEN is Greta Gerwig’s twenty first century take on Louisa May Alcott’s enduring story that has seen a spate of big and small screen adaptations and it is a winner.

While Gerwig stays true to Alcott’s original voice, she reconstructs the novel in an inherently cinematic way, unmooring the story from linear time, transforming the March’s most unforgettable events into the stuff of memories and creative inspiration. This invites audiences to engage with the March
sisters as something new: as adults looking back, and as the living source for Jo’s writing.

The casting is superb- Saoirse Ronan as Jo embodies the vortex of creativity that Alcott described, Emma Watson plays Meg, the eldest sister and major domo of Marmee, her mother’s lieutenant and domestic goddess with an ardour for tradition and true love.

Eliza Scanlen as Beth, preciously, precariously, perilously fragile but with a mental fortitude and grace that glows with glorious pragmatism, the gently passionate musician who radiates joy and genuine fondness.

Florence Pugh as Amy is a powerhouse of pugnacious prank and spunk.
Laura Dern is simply marvellous Marmee, ditto Meryl Streep is Aunt March.
The blokes are pretty impressive too.

Timothee Chalamet is Laurie, Louis Garrel as Friederich, Chris Cooper heart breakingly, heart achingly swell as Mr. Laurence.

Bob Odenkirk as Dad and Tracy Letts as Jo’s first literary editor and publisher round out the boy quotient.

Many may wonder why another cinematic version of Louisa May Alcott’s perennial page turner, LITTLE WOMEN, is warranted.

When it’s this wonderful, you’ll wonder less.