*_Book excerpt, part 1_* _Mrs. Jennings left them earlier than usual; for she could not be easy till the Middletons and Palmers were able to grieve as much as herself; and positively refusing Elinor’s offered attendance, went out alone for the rest of the morning. Elinor, with a very heavy heart, aware of the pain she was going to communicate, and perceiving, by Marianne’s letter, how ill she had succeeded in laying any foundation for it, then sat down to write her mother an account of what had passed, and entreat her directions for the future; while Marianne, who came into the drawing-room on Mrs. Jennings’s going away, remained fixed at the table where Elinor wrote, watching the advancement of her pen, grieving over her for the hardship of such a task, and grieving still more fondly over its effect on her mother._ _In this manner they had continued about a quarter of an hour, when Marianne, whose nerves could not then bear any sudden noise, was startled by a rap at the door._ _“Who can this be?” cried Elinor. “So early too! I thought we had been safe.”_ _Marianne moved to the window._ _“It is Colonel Brandon!” said she, with vexation. “We are never safe from him.”_ _“He will not come in, as Mrs. Jennings is from home.”_ _“I will not trust to that,” retreating to her own room. “A man who has nothing to do with his own time has no conscience in his intrusion on that of others.”_ _The event proved her conjecture right, though it was founded on injustice and error; for Colonel Brandon did come in; and Elinor, who was convinced that solicitude for Marianne brought him thither, and who saw that solicitude in his disturbed and melancholy look, and in his anxious though brief inquiry after her, could not forgive her sister for esteeming him so lightly._ _“I met Mrs. Jennings in Bond Street,” said he, after the first salutation, “and she encouraged me to come on; and I was the more easily encouraged, because I thought it probable that I might find you alone, which I was very desirous of doing. My object-my wish-my sole wish in desiring it-I hope, I believe it is-is to be a means of giving comfort;-no, I must not say comfort-not present comfort-but conviction, lasting conviction to your sister’s mind. My regard for her, for yourself, for your mother-will you allow me to prove it, by relating some circumstances which nothing but a very sincere regard-nothing but an earnest desire of being useful-I think I am justified-though where so many hours have been spent in convincing myself that I am right, is there not some reason to fear I may be wrong?” He stopped._ _“I understand you,” said Elinor. “You have something to tell me of Mr. Willoughby, that will open his character farther. Your telling it will be the greatest act of friendship that can be shown Marianne. My gratitude will be insured immediately by any information tending to that end, and hers must be gained by it in time. Pray, pray let me hear it.”_ _“You shall; and, to be brief, when I quitted Barton last October,-but this will give you no idea-I must go farther back. You will find me a very awkward narrator, Miss Dashwood; I hardly know where to begin. A short account of myself, I believe, will be necessary, and it shall be a short one. On such a subject,” sighing heavily, “can I have little temptation to be diffuse.”_ _He stopt a moment for recollection, and then, with another sigh, went on._ _“You have probably entirely forgotten a conversation-(it is not to be supposed that it could make any impression on you)-a conversation between us one evening at Barton Park-it was the evening of a dance-in which I alluded to a lady I had once known, as resembling, in some measure, your sister Marianne.”_ _“Indeed,” answered Elinor, “I have not forgotten it.” He looked pleased by this remembrance, and added,_ _“If I am not deceived by the uncertainty, the partiality of tender recollection, there is a very strong resemblance between them, as well in mind as person. The same warmth of heart, the same eagerness of fancy and spirits. This lady was one of my nearest relations, an orphan from her infancy, and under the guardianship of my father. Our ages were nearly the same, and from our earliest years we were playfellows and friends. I cannot remember the time when I did not love Eliza; and my affection for her, as we grew up, was such, as perhaps, judging from my present forlorn and cheerless gravity, you might think me incapable of having ever felt. Hers, for me, was, I believe, fervent as the attachment of your sister to Mr. Willoughby and it was, though from a different cause, no less unfortunate. At seventeen she was lost to me for ever. She was married-married against her inclination to my brother. Her fortune was large, and our family estate much encumbered. And this, I fear, is all that can be said for the conduct of one, who was at once her uncle and guardian. My brother did not deserve her; he did not even love her. I had hoped that her regard for me would support her under any difficulty, and for some time it did; but at last the misery of her situation, for she experienced great unkindness, overcame all her resolution, and though she had promised me that nothing-but how blindly I relate! I have never told you how this was brought on. We were within a few hours of eloping together for Scotland. The treachery, or the folly, of my cousin’s maid betrayed us. I was banished to the house of a relation far distant, and she was allowed no liberty, no society, no amusement, till my father’s point was gained. I had depended on her fortitude too far, and the blow was a severe one-but had her marriage been happy, so young as I then was, a few months must have reconciled me to it, or at least I should not have now to lament it. This however was not the case. My brother had no regard for her; his pleasures were not what they ought to have been, and from the first he treated her unkindly. The consequence of this, upon a mind so young, so lively, so inexperienced as Mrs. Brandon’s, was but too natural. She resigned herself at first to all the misery of her situation; and happy had it been if she had not lived to overcome those regrets which the remembrance of me occasioned. But can we wonder that, with such a husband to provoke inconstancy, and without a friend to advise or restrain her (for my father lived only a few months after their marriage, and I was with my regiment in the East Indies) she should fall? Had I remained in England, perhaps-but I meant to promote the happiness of both by removing from her for years, and for that purpose had procured my exchange. The shock which her marriage had given me,” he continued, in a voice of great agitation, “was of trifling weight-was nothing to what I felt when I heard, about two years afterwards, of her divorce. It was that which threw this gloom,-even now the recollection of what I suffered-”_ _He could say no more, and rising hastily walked for a few minutes about the room. Elinor, affected by his relation, and still more by his distress, could not speak. He saw her concern, and coming to her, took her hand, pressed it, and kissed it with grateful respect. A few minutes more of silent exertion enabled him to proceed with composure._ _“It was nearly three years after this unhappy period before I returned to England. My first care, when I did arrive, was of course to seek for her; but the search was as fruitless as it was melancholy. I could not trace her beyond her first seducer, and there was every reason to fear that she had removed from him only to sink deeper in a life of sin. Her legal allowance was not adequate to her fortune, nor sufficient for her comfortable maintenance, and I learnt from my brother that the power of receiving it had been made over some months before to another person. He imagined, and calmly could he imagine it, that her extravagance, and consequent distress, had obliged her to dispose of it for some immediate relief. At last, however, and after I had been six months in England, I did find her. Regard for a former servant of my own, who had since fallen into misfortune, carried me to visit him in a spunging-house, where he was confined for debt; and there, in the same house, under a similar confinement, was my unfortunate sister. So altered-so faded-worn down by acute suffering of every kind! hardly could I believe the melancholy and sickly figure before me, to be the remains of the lovely, blooming, healthful girl, on whom I had once doted. What I endured in so beholding her-but I have no right to wound your feelings by attempting to describe it-I have pained you too much already. That she was, to all appearance, in the last stage of a consumption, was-yes, in such a situation it was my greatest comfort. Life could do nothing for her, beyond giving time for a better preparation for death; and that was given. I saw her placed in comfortable lodgings, and under proper attendants; I visited her every day during the rest of her short life: I was with her in her last moments.”_ _Again he stopped to recover himself; and Elinor spoke her feelings in an exclamation of tender concern, at the fate of his unfortunate friend._ *_Sense & Sensibility, Chapter 31_*
Your format of providing the film clip along with pinning the appropriate accompanying text in the comments is inspired. Excellent channel, thank you for posting
Real love is what Colonel Brandon does in this scene. He only wanted to tell Elinor to lessen Marianne’s suffering. But to ease it more, he said that Willoughby would have married her if not for his indiscretions.
Colonel Brandon is a man of integrity and honor. Willoughby's love for Marianne may have been sincere, but it was also fleeting. The moment trouble came to him, he abandoned Marianne to pursue a more wealthy prospect in Ms. Grey to save himself from disgrace and ruin. He abandoned a woman who was carrying his child, he abandoned Marianne and when Ms. Grey's fortune is spent, he will abandon her, as well. When Brandon learns of Willoughby's vile actions, he, as you said, told Elinor this truth to soften the blow dealt to Maryanne's heart and tried to ease her suffering more by saying that Willoughby would have married Maryanne had he not betrayed her by impregnating another woman. When Maryanne is gravely ill, it is Brandon who goes for her mother and brings her to her daughter's bedside to comfort her.
Brandon could, if he wished, have destroyed Marianne and Willoughby's romance anytime he wanted, by exposing Willoughby's dirty secret. This would have avenged Beth by ruining Willoughby's reputation, and it would have benefited Brandon himself by removing the main competitor for Marianne's affections. But he held his tongue because Willoughby made Marianne happy.
Brandon was a kind gentelman and had a noble soul. He loved her truly and wanted her happiness even if it was not by his side .That's the biggest difference between him and the scoundrel Willoughby.
Not only did he have to act his characters well but he was perpetually playing characters who were at leat 10 & 15 years younger than he actually was. That voice & diction!
The casting in this version is way off for the accurate ages of most of the characters. Emma Thompson was in her mid-30's and Elinor is supposed to be 19. Likewise Hugh Grant is a year younger than Emma Thompson, but Edward Ferrars is supposed to be in his early 20s. It's like they aged most of the cast up 15 years! It was probably deliberate as the Austen ages of the characters would seem very young to a 20th Century audience.
To watch each and every character that Alan had portrayed, I see different people not him. That is how wonderful Alan's acting is. He makes us look the characters and their depth. And his voice, it is on a totally different level. Dearly miss him. P.S. I do fall for his handsomeness though 😂
It's important to know that this scene combines two book scenes: Brandon here explaining Willoughby's intentions of marriage replaces, in fact, a later scene in the book in which Willoughby comes to explain himself to Elinor when he is afraid Marianne will die.
It's the same either way though - he loved Marianne but not enough to be honest with her or to consider how she might be affected by his actions or to marry for less money than he wanted.
*_Book excerpt, part 2_* _“Your sister, I hope, cannot be offended,” said he (Col. Brandon), “by the resemblance I have fancied between her and my poor disgraced relation. Their fates, their fortunes, cannot be the same; and had the natural sweet disposition of the one been guarded by a firmer mind, or a happier marriage, she might have been all that you will live to see the other be. But to what does all this lead? I seem to have been distressing you for nothing. Ah! Miss Dashwood-a subject such as this-untouched for fourteen years-it is dangerous to handle it at all! I will be more collected-more concise. She left to my care her only child, a little girl, the offspring of her first guilty connection, who was then about three years old. She loved the child, and had always kept it with her. It was a valued, a precious trust to me; and gladly would I have discharged it in the strictest sense, by watching over her education myself, had the nature of our situations allowed it; but I had no family, no home; and my little Eliza was therefore placed at school. I saw her there whenever I could, and after the death of my brother, (which happened about five years ago, and which left to me the possession of the family property,) she visited me at Delaford. I called her a distant relation; but I am well aware that I have in general been suspected of a much nearer connection with her. It is now three years ago (she had just reached her fourteenth year,) that I removed her from school, to place her under the care of a very respectable woman, residing in Dorsetshire, who had the charge of four or five other girls of about the same time of life; and for two years I had every reason to be pleased with her situation. But last February, almost a twelvemonth back, she suddenly disappeared. I had allowed her, (imprudently, as it has since turned out,) at her earnest desire, to go to Bath with one of her young friends, who was attending her father there for his health. I knew him to be a very good sort of man, and I thought well of his daughter-better than she deserved, for, with a most obstinate and ill-judged secrecy, she would tell nothing, would give no clue, though she certainly knew all. He, her father, a well-meaning, but not a quick-sighted man, could really, I believe, give no information; for he had been generally confined to the house, while the girls were ranging over the town and making what acquaintance they chose; and he tried to convince me, as thoroughly as he was convinced himself, of his daughter’s being entirely unconcerned in the business. In short, I could learn nothing but that she was gone; all the rest, for eight long months, was left to conjecture. What I thought, what I feared, may be imagined; and what I suffered too.”_ _“Good heavens!” cried Elinor, “could it be-could Willoughby!”-_ _“The first news that reached me of her,” he continued, “came in a letter from herself, last October. It was forwarded to me from Delaford, and I received it on the very morning of our intended party to Whitwell; and this was the reason of my leaving Barton so suddenly, which I am sure must at the time have appeared strange to every body, and which I believe gave offence to some. Little did Mr. Willoughby imagine, I suppose, when his looks censured me for incivility in breaking up the party, that I was called away to the relief of one whom he had made poor and miserable; but had he known it, what would it have availed? Would he have been less gay or less happy in the smiles of your sister? No, he had already done that, which no man who can feel for another would do. He had left the girl whose youth and innocence he had seduced, in a situation of the utmost distress, with no creditable home, no help, no friends, ignorant of his address! He had left her, promising to return; he neither returned, nor wrote, nor relieved her.”_ _“This is beyond every thing!” exclaimed Elinor._ _“His character is now before you; expensive, dissipated, and worse than both. Knowing all this, as I have now known it many weeks, guess what I must have felt on seeing your sister as fond of him as ever, and on being assured that she was to marry him: guess what I must have felt for all your sakes. When I came to you last week and found you alone, I came determined to know the truth; though irresolute what to do when it was known. My behaviour must have seemed strange to you then; but now you will comprehend it. To suffer you all to be so deceived; to see your sister-but what could I do? I had no hope of interfering with success; and sometimes I thought your sister’s influence might yet reclaim him. But now, after such dishonorable usage, who can tell what were his designs on her. Whatever they may have been, however, she may now, and hereafter doubtless will turn with gratitude towards her own condition, when she compares it with that of my poor Eliza, when she considers the wretched and hopeless situation of this poor girl, and pictures her to herself, with an affection for him so strong, still as strong as her own, and with a mind tormented by self-reproach, which must attend her through life. Surely this comparison must have its use with her. She will feel her own sufferings to be nothing. They proceed from no misconduct, and can bring no disgrace. On the contrary, every friend must be made still more her friend by them. Concern for her unhappiness, and respect for her fortitude under it, must strengthen every attachment. Use your own discretion, however, in communicating to her what I have told you. You must know best what will be its effect; but had I not seriously, and from my heart believed it might be of service, might lessen her regrets, I would not have suffered myself to trouble you with this account of my family afflictions, with a recital which may seem to have been intended to raise myself at the expense of others.”_ _Elinor’s thanks followed this speech with grateful earnestness; attended too with the assurance of her expecting material advantage to Marianne, from the communication of what had passed._ _“I have been more pained,” said she, “by her endeavors to acquit him than by all the rest; for it irritates her mind more than the most perfect conviction of his unworthiness can do. Now, though at first she will suffer much, I am sure she will soon become easier. Have you,” she continued, after a short silence, “ever seen Mr. Willoughby since you left him at Barton?”_ _“Yes,” he replied gravely, “once I have. One meeting was unavoidable.”_ _Elinor, startled by his manner, looked at him anxiously, saying,_ _“What? have you met him to-”_ _“I could meet him no other way. Eliza had confessed to me, though most reluctantly, the name of her lover; and when he returned to town, which was within a fortnight after myself, we met by appointment, he to defend, I to punish his conduct. We returned unwounded, and the meeting, therefore, never got abroad.”_ _Elinor sighed over the fancied necessity of this; but to a man and a soldier she presumed not to censure it._ _“Such,” said Colonel Brandon, after a pause, “has been the unhappy resemblance between the fate of mother and daughter! and so imperfectly have I discharged my trust!”_ _“Is she still in town?”_ _“No; as soon as she recovered from her lying-in, for I found her near her delivery, I removed her and her child into the country, and there she remains.”_ _Recollecting, soon afterwards, that he was probably dividing Elinor from her sister, he put an end to his visit, receiving from her again the same grateful acknowledgments, and leaving her full of compassion and esteem for him._ _When the particulars of this conversation were repeated by Miss Dashwood to her sister, as they very soon were, the effect on her was not entirely such as the former had hoped to see. Not that Marianne appeared to distrust the truth of any part of it, for she listened to it all with the most steady and submissive attention, made neither objection nor remark, attempted no vindication of Willoughby, and seemed to show by her tears that she felt it to be impossible. But though this behaviour assured Elinor that the conviction of this guilt was carried home to her mind, though she saw with satisfaction the effect of it, in her no longer avoiding Colonel Brandon when he called, in her speaking to him, even voluntarily speaking, with a kind of compassionate respect, and though she saw her spirits less violently irritated than before, she did not see her less wretched. Her mind did become settled, but it was settled in a gloomy dejection. She felt the loss of Willoughby’s character yet more heavily than she had felt the loss of his heart; his seduction and desertion of Miss Williams, the misery of that poor girl, and the doubt of what his designs might once have been on herself, preyed altogether so much on her spirits, that she could not bring herself to speak of what she felt even to Elinor; and, brooding over her sorrows in silence, gave more pain to her sister than could have been communicated by the most open and most frequent confession of them._ *_Sense & Sensibility, Chapters 31 & 32_*
I wonder how the Eliza's friend felt when she heard that Willoughby had deserted her. I know, he didn't know she was pregnant when he left her but he left her all the same - and no matter what he said about her needing common sense to find out where he was, I don't really think a young lady could just go and ask about a man she's not related to back then, not to people she doesn't even know. Think her friend was being stubborn, thought that she was helping her friend in a great romance, or jsut kept quiet because sees was scared of getting into trouble?
Marianne loved to suffer and display her suffering - she felt superior to Elinor in this regard. Until she understood her sister better, Marianne had believed that Elinor was emotionless.
Similarities, yes. But Wickham was worse. A skilled liar and manipulator. Willoughby's worst sin was ruining a woman's reputation, and then devastating another in an attempt at self-preservation. Wickham was greedy and malicious.
Creators of a modern medium such as film, cannot have the ability to snap their fingers to find great, mature age-specific actors to play great, mature characters from a great, mature writer such as Miss Austen. Count your blessings. Of all the tries over the years, this film packs a wallop.
Not sure it's the talent that's lacking, rather the commitment to storytelling. Too much studio interference, etc. But I see your point. Don't know when we'll get another Rickman.
Alan Rickman and Emma Thompson were actor friends from decades before as they were starting out in their field as thespians, so great to see them acting together in Sense and Sensibility, as well as on the holiday film Love Actually. Thompson wrote the screenplay for Sense and Sensibility but never intended to act it the film, till the director encouraged her to take the role of the older sister. Such great casting. Ironically, Emma Thompson married actor Greg Wise, who played the role of the cad Willoughby in Sense and Sensibility.
Wow, Marianne dodged a bullet. She thought she was engaged to a rich man, but he had just lost his fortune. Would SHE have wanted to gone through with the wedding if she knew he had lost his inheritance? For all her "sensibility," she was only ever attracted to very rich men.
Creations in modern times, as presented in a modern medium such as film, cannot always be rendered having found living extraordinary actors of the same age as characters in a great, mature classic novel. Who else could you cast, @huolalupin6008? Count your blessings, you ingrate!
*_Book excerpt, part 1_*
_Mrs. Jennings left them earlier than usual; for she could not be easy till the Middletons and Palmers were able to grieve as much as herself; and positively refusing Elinor’s offered attendance, went out alone for the rest of the morning. Elinor, with a very heavy heart, aware of the pain she was going to communicate, and perceiving, by Marianne’s letter, how ill she had succeeded in laying any foundation for it, then sat down to write her mother an account of what had passed, and entreat her directions for the future; while Marianne, who came into the drawing-room on Mrs. Jennings’s going away, remained fixed at the table where Elinor wrote, watching the advancement of her pen, grieving over her for the hardship of such a task, and grieving still more fondly over its effect on her mother._
_In this manner they had continued about a quarter of an hour, when Marianne, whose nerves could not then bear any sudden noise, was startled by a rap at the door._
_“Who can this be?” cried Elinor. “So early too! I thought we had been safe.”_
_Marianne moved to the window._
_“It is Colonel Brandon!” said she, with vexation. “We are never safe from him.”_
_“He will not come in, as Mrs. Jennings is from home.”_
_“I will not trust to that,” retreating to her own room. “A man who has nothing to do with his own time has no conscience in his intrusion on that of others.”_
_The event proved her conjecture right, though it was founded on injustice and error; for Colonel Brandon did come in; and Elinor, who was convinced that solicitude for Marianne brought him thither, and who saw that solicitude in his disturbed and melancholy look, and in his anxious though brief inquiry after her, could not forgive her sister for esteeming him so lightly._
_“I met Mrs. Jennings in Bond Street,” said he, after the first salutation, “and she encouraged me to come on; and I was the more easily encouraged, because I thought it probable that I might find you alone, which I was very desirous of doing. My object-my wish-my sole wish in desiring it-I hope, I believe it is-is to be a means of giving comfort;-no, I must not say comfort-not present comfort-but conviction, lasting conviction to your sister’s mind. My regard for her, for yourself, for your mother-will you allow me to prove it, by relating some circumstances which nothing but a very sincere regard-nothing but an earnest desire of being useful-I think I am justified-though where so many hours have been spent in convincing myself that I am right, is there not some reason to fear I may be wrong?” He stopped._
_“I understand you,” said Elinor. “You have something to tell me of Mr. Willoughby, that will open his character farther. Your telling it will be the greatest act of friendship that can be shown Marianne. My gratitude will be insured immediately by any information tending to that end, and hers must be gained by it in time. Pray, pray let me hear it.”_
_“You shall; and, to be brief, when I quitted Barton last October,-but this will give you no idea-I must go farther back. You will find me a very awkward narrator, Miss Dashwood; I hardly know where to begin. A short account of myself, I believe, will be necessary, and it shall be a short one. On such a subject,” sighing heavily, “can I have little temptation to be diffuse.”_
_He stopt a moment for recollection, and then, with another sigh, went on._
_“You have probably entirely forgotten a conversation-(it is not to be supposed that it could make any impression on you)-a conversation between us one evening at Barton Park-it was the evening of a dance-in which I alluded to a lady I had once known, as resembling, in some measure, your sister Marianne.”_
_“Indeed,” answered Elinor, “I have not forgotten it.” He looked pleased by this remembrance, and added,_
_“If I am not deceived by the uncertainty, the partiality of tender recollection, there is a very strong resemblance between them, as well in mind as person. The same warmth of heart, the same eagerness of fancy and spirits. This lady was one of my nearest relations, an orphan from her infancy, and under the guardianship of my father. Our ages were nearly the same, and from our earliest years we were playfellows and friends. I cannot remember the time when I did not love Eliza; and my affection for her, as we grew up, was such, as perhaps, judging from my present forlorn and cheerless gravity, you might think me incapable of having ever felt. Hers, for me, was, I believe, fervent as the attachment of your sister to Mr. Willoughby and it was, though from a different cause, no less unfortunate. At seventeen she was lost to me for ever. She was married-married against her inclination to my brother. Her fortune was large, and our family estate much encumbered. And this, I fear, is all that can be said for the conduct of one, who was at once her uncle and guardian. My brother did not deserve her; he did not even love her. I had hoped that her regard for me would support her under any difficulty, and for some time it did; but at last the misery of her situation, for she experienced great unkindness, overcame all her resolution, and though she had promised me that nothing-but how blindly I relate! I have never told you how this was brought on. We were within a few hours of eloping together for Scotland. The treachery, or the folly, of my cousin’s maid betrayed us. I was banished to the house of a relation far distant, and she was allowed no liberty, no society, no amusement, till my father’s point was gained. I had depended on her fortitude too far, and the blow was a severe one-but had her marriage been happy, so young as I then was, a few months must have reconciled me to it, or at least I should not have now to lament it. This however was not the case. My brother had no regard for her; his pleasures were not what they ought to have been, and from the first he treated her unkindly. The consequence of this, upon a mind so young, so lively, so inexperienced as Mrs. Brandon’s, was but too natural. She resigned herself at first to all the misery of her situation; and happy had it been if she had not lived to overcome those regrets which the remembrance of me occasioned. But can we wonder that, with such a husband to provoke inconstancy, and without a friend to advise or restrain her (for my father lived only a few months after their marriage, and I was with my regiment in the East Indies) she should fall? Had I remained in England, perhaps-but I meant to promote the happiness of both by removing from her for years, and for that purpose had procured my exchange. The shock which her marriage had given me,” he continued, in a voice of great agitation, “was of trifling weight-was nothing to what I felt when I heard, about two years afterwards, of her divorce. It was that which threw this gloom,-even now the recollection of what I suffered-”_
_He could say no more, and rising hastily walked for a few minutes about the room. Elinor, affected by his relation, and still more by his distress, could not speak. He saw her concern, and coming to her, took her hand, pressed it, and kissed it with grateful respect. A few minutes more of silent exertion enabled him to proceed with composure._
_“It was nearly three years after this unhappy period before I returned to England. My first care, when I did arrive, was of course to seek for her; but the search was as fruitless as it was melancholy. I could not trace her beyond her first seducer, and there was every reason to fear that she had removed from him only to sink deeper in a life of sin. Her legal allowance was not adequate to her fortune, nor sufficient for her comfortable maintenance, and I learnt from my brother that the power of receiving it had been made over some months before to another person. He imagined, and calmly could he imagine it, that her extravagance, and consequent distress, had obliged her to dispose of it for some immediate relief. At last, however, and after I had been six months in England, I did find her. Regard for a former servant of my own, who had since fallen into misfortune, carried me to visit him in a spunging-house, where he was confined for debt; and there, in the same house, under a similar confinement, was my unfortunate sister. So altered-so faded-worn down by acute suffering of every kind! hardly could I believe the melancholy and sickly figure before me, to be the remains of the lovely, blooming, healthful girl, on whom I had once doted. What I endured in so beholding her-but I have no right to wound your feelings by attempting to describe it-I have pained you too much already. That she was, to all appearance, in the last stage of a consumption, was-yes, in such a situation it was my greatest comfort. Life could do nothing for her, beyond giving time for a better preparation for death; and that was given. I saw her placed in comfortable lodgings, and under proper attendants; I visited her every day during the rest of her short life: I was with her in her last moments.”_
_Again he stopped to recover himself; and Elinor spoke her feelings in an exclamation of tender concern, at the fate of his unfortunate friend._
*_Sense & Sensibility, Chapter 31_*
Your format of providing the film clip along with pinning the appropriate accompanying text in the comments is inspired. Excellent channel, thank you for posting
Alan Rickman was handsome and wonderful actor! Rest In Peace 😢
I love the sound of his voice and his distinctive phrasing and pauses.
oh i had such a crush on him ....rih Alan .......always
Amen
And his voice...ah!
So handsome and I don’t care who says otherwise!!
Real love is what Colonel Brandon does in this scene. He only wanted to tell Elinor to lessen Marianne’s suffering. But to ease it more, he said that Willoughby would have married her if not for his indiscretions.
Colonel Brandon is a man of integrity and honor. Willoughby's love for Marianne may have been sincere, but it was also fleeting. The moment trouble came to him, he abandoned Marianne to pursue a more wealthy prospect in Ms. Grey to save himself from disgrace and ruin. He abandoned a woman who was carrying his child, he abandoned Marianne and when Ms. Grey's fortune is spent, he will abandon her, as well. When Brandon learns of Willoughby's vile actions, he, as you said, told Elinor this truth to soften the blow dealt to Maryanne's heart and tried to ease her suffering more by saying that Willoughby would have married Maryanne had he not betrayed her by impregnating another woman. When Maryanne is gravely ill, it is Brandon who goes for her mother and brings her to her daughter's bedside to comfort her.
Brandon could, if he wished, have destroyed Marianne and Willoughby's romance anytime he wanted, by exposing Willoughby's dirty secret. This would have avenged Beth by ruining Willoughby's reputation, and it would have benefited Brandon himself by removing the main competitor for Marianne's affections. But he held his tongue because Willoughby made Marianne happy.
Brandon was a kind gentelman and had a noble soul. He loved her truly and wanted her happiness even if it was not by his side .That's the biggest difference between him and the scoundrel Willoughby.
The tea in this movie was piping hot
Nothing else was.
@@huolalupin6008Sweetheart they all were
Not as hot as Lady Chatterington’s SocieTea! 😂 Her channel is fire 🔥
Good news: You're not crazy, he *did* like you, but baby you hella dodged a bullet
Well if this isn't a sign from the universe 😂
😂
Alan Rickman was as handsome as his perfect pitch voice was sexy.❤
It was damn sexy...that kind of voice would easily put me to sleep while reading a good love story.
Another ten points from Gryffindor. I would expect nothing more sophisticated from you, Ronald Weasley
Fantastic ❤miss u Mr Rickman....and Brandon gives Mr D'Arcy a run for his money...❤
Not only did he have to act his characters well but he was perpetually playing characters who were at leat 10 & 15 years younger than he actually was. That voice & diction!
The casting in this version is way off for the accurate ages of most of the characters. Emma Thompson was in her mid-30's and Elinor is supposed to be 19. Likewise Hugh Grant is a year younger than Emma Thompson, but Edward Ferrars is supposed to be in his early 20s.
It's like they aged most of the cast up 15 years! It was probably deliberate as the Austen ages of the characters would seem very young to a 20th Century audience.
Rickman was about 50 when he did this, so Colonel Brandon was supposed to be in his mid 30s?
@@ShadowSonic2 Yup, exactly 35.
I used to have this movie on DVD, and when I left for college my mom got rid of it, and I'm m still salty about it.
OMG! I would have been pissed off too! Dammnn sorry to hear
@@duffydreamer I've just found it in a charity shop!
You do know you can buy a new one, right? They still sell it!
This was his mr darcy moment
To watch each and every character that Alan had portrayed, I see different people not him. That is how wonderful Alan's acting is. He makes us look the characters and their depth. And his voice, it is on a totally different level. Dearly miss him.
P.S. I do fall for his handsomeness though 😂
"But not enough"
"Not enough"
Me:😭😭😭
Dude needed lots of scratch - he had debts and enjoyed a certain lifestyle. He didn’t want to be poor.
It's important to know that this scene combines two book scenes: Brandon here explaining Willoughby's intentions of marriage replaces, in fact, a later scene in the book in which Willoughby comes to explain himself to Elinor when he is afraid Marianne will die.
It's the same either way though - he loved Marianne but not enough to be honest with her or to consider how she might be affected by his actions or to marry for less money than he wanted.
*_Book excerpt, part 2_*
_“Your sister, I hope, cannot be offended,” said he (Col. Brandon), “by the resemblance I have fancied between her and my poor disgraced relation. Their fates, their fortunes, cannot be the same; and had the natural sweet disposition of the one been guarded by a firmer mind, or a happier marriage, she might have been all that you will live to see the other be. But to what does all this lead? I seem to have been distressing you for nothing. Ah! Miss Dashwood-a subject such as this-untouched for fourteen years-it is dangerous to handle it at all! I will be more collected-more concise. She left to my care her only child, a little girl, the offspring of her first guilty connection, who was then about three years old. She loved the child, and had always kept it with her. It was a valued, a precious trust to me; and gladly would I have discharged it in the strictest sense, by watching over her education myself, had the nature of our situations allowed it; but I had no family, no home; and my little Eliza was therefore placed at school. I saw her there whenever I could, and after the death of my brother, (which happened about five years ago, and which left to me the possession of the family property,) she visited me at Delaford. I called her a distant relation; but I am well aware that I have in general been suspected of a much nearer connection with her. It is now three years ago (she had just reached her fourteenth year,) that I removed her from school, to place her under the care of a very respectable woman, residing in Dorsetshire, who had the charge of four or five other girls of about the same time of life; and for two years I had every reason to be pleased with her situation. But last February, almost a twelvemonth back, she suddenly disappeared. I had allowed her, (imprudently, as it has since turned out,) at her earnest desire, to go to Bath with one of her young friends, who was attending her father there for his health. I knew him to be a very good sort of man, and I thought well of his daughter-better than she deserved, for, with a most obstinate and ill-judged secrecy, she would tell nothing, would give no clue, though she certainly knew all. He, her father, a well-meaning, but not a quick-sighted man, could really, I believe, give no information; for he had been generally confined to the house, while the girls were ranging over the town and making what acquaintance they chose; and he tried to convince me, as thoroughly as he was convinced himself, of his daughter’s being entirely unconcerned in the business. In short, I could learn nothing but that she was gone; all the rest, for eight long months, was left to conjecture. What I thought, what I feared, may be imagined; and what I suffered too.”_
_“Good heavens!” cried Elinor, “could it be-could Willoughby!”-_
_“The first news that reached me of her,” he continued, “came in a letter from herself, last October. It was forwarded to me from Delaford, and I received it on the very morning of our intended party to Whitwell; and this was the reason of my leaving Barton so suddenly, which I am sure must at the time have appeared strange to every body, and which I believe gave offence to some. Little did Mr. Willoughby imagine, I suppose, when his looks censured me for incivility in breaking up the party, that I was called away to the relief of one whom he had made poor and miserable; but had he known it, what would it have availed? Would he have been less gay or less happy in the smiles of your sister? No, he had already done that, which no man who can feel for another would do. He had left the girl whose youth and innocence he had seduced, in a situation of the utmost distress, with no creditable home, no help, no friends, ignorant of his address! He had left her, promising to return; he neither returned, nor wrote, nor relieved her.”_
_“This is beyond every thing!” exclaimed Elinor._
_“His character is now before you; expensive, dissipated, and worse than both. Knowing all this, as I have now known it many weeks, guess what I must have felt on seeing your sister as fond of him as ever, and on being assured that she was to marry him: guess what I must have felt for all your sakes. When I came to you last week and found you alone, I came determined to know the truth; though irresolute what to do when it was known. My behaviour must have seemed strange to you then; but now you will comprehend it. To suffer you all to be so deceived; to see your sister-but what could I do? I had no hope of interfering with success; and sometimes I thought your sister’s influence might yet reclaim him. But now, after such dishonorable usage, who can tell what were his designs on her. Whatever they may have been, however, she may now, and hereafter doubtless will turn with gratitude towards her own condition, when she compares it with that of my poor Eliza, when she considers the wretched and hopeless situation of this poor girl, and pictures her to herself, with an affection for him so strong, still as strong as her own, and with a mind tormented by self-reproach, which must attend her through life. Surely this comparison must have its use with her. She will feel her own sufferings to be nothing. They proceed from no misconduct, and can bring no disgrace. On the contrary, every friend must be made still more her friend by them. Concern for her unhappiness, and respect for her fortitude under it, must strengthen every attachment. Use your own discretion, however, in communicating to her what I have told you. You must know best what will be its effect; but had I not seriously, and from my heart believed it might be of service, might lessen her regrets, I would not have suffered myself to trouble you with this account of my family afflictions, with a recital which may seem to have been intended to raise myself at the expense of others.”_
_Elinor’s thanks followed this speech with grateful earnestness; attended too with the assurance of her expecting material advantage to Marianne, from the communication of what had passed._
_“I have been more pained,” said she, “by her endeavors to acquit him than by all the rest; for it irritates her mind more than the most perfect conviction of his unworthiness can do. Now, though at first she will suffer much, I am sure she will soon become easier. Have you,” she continued, after a short silence, “ever seen Mr. Willoughby since you left him at Barton?”_
_“Yes,” he replied gravely, “once I have. One meeting was unavoidable.”_
_Elinor, startled by his manner, looked at him anxiously, saying,_
_“What? have you met him to-”_
_“I could meet him no other way. Eliza had confessed to me, though most reluctantly, the name of her lover; and when he returned to town, which was within a fortnight after myself, we met by appointment, he to defend, I to punish his conduct. We returned unwounded, and the meeting, therefore, never got abroad.”_
_Elinor sighed over the fancied necessity of this; but to a man and a soldier she presumed not to censure it._
_“Such,” said Colonel Brandon, after a pause, “has been the unhappy resemblance between the fate of mother and daughter! and so imperfectly have I discharged my trust!”_
_“Is she still in town?”_
_“No; as soon as she recovered from her lying-in, for I found her near her delivery, I removed her and her child into the country, and there she remains.”_
_Recollecting, soon afterwards, that he was probably dividing Elinor from her sister, he put an end to his visit, receiving from her again the same grateful acknowledgments, and leaving her full of compassion and esteem for him._
_When the particulars of this conversation were repeated by Miss Dashwood to her sister, as they very soon were, the effect on her was not entirely such as the former had hoped to see. Not that Marianne appeared to distrust the truth of any part of it, for she listened to it all with the most steady and submissive attention, made neither objection nor remark, attempted no vindication of Willoughby, and seemed to show by her tears that she felt it to be impossible. But though this behaviour assured Elinor that the conviction of this guilt was carried home to her mind, though she saw with satisfaction the effect of it, in her no longer avoiding Colonel Brandon when he called, in her speaking to him, even voluntarily speaking, with a kind of compassionate respect, and though she saw her spirits less violently irritated than before, she did not see her less wretched. Her mind did become settled, but it was settled in a gloomy dejection. She felt the loss of Willoughby’s character yet more heavily than she had felt the loss of his heart; his seduction and desertion of Miss Williams, the misery of that poor girl, and the doubt of what his designs might once have been on herself, preyed altogether so much on her spirits, that she could not bring herself to speak of what she felt even to Elinor; and, brooding over her sorrows in silence, gave more pain to her sister than could have been communicated by the most open and most frequent confession of them._
*_Sense & Sensibility, Chapters 31 & 32_*
I wonder how the Eliza's friend felt when she heard that Willoughby had deserted her. I know, he didn't know she was pregnant when he left her but he left her all the same - and no matter what he said about her needing common sense to find out where he was, I don't really think a young lady could just go and ask about a man she's not related to back then, not to people she doesn't even know.
Think her friend was being stubborn, thought that she was helping her friend in a great romance, or jsut kept quiet because sees was scared of getting into trouble?
Marianne loved to suffer and display her suffering - she felt superior to Elinor in this regard. Until she understood her sister better, Marianne had believed that Elinor was emotionless.
Yes!
I notice quite a few similarities between Mr. Willoughby and Mr. Wickham from Pride & Prejudice. Anyone else?
cads, the lot of them!
The primary difference is that Willoughby genuinely loved Marianne. Wickham doesn’t love anyone but himself.
Similarities, yes. But Wickham was worse. A skilled liar and manipulator. Willoughby's worst sin was ruining a woman's reputation, and then devastating another in an attempt at self-preservation. Wickham was greedy and malicious.
It seems like a story Austen herself probably heard more than once.
@@humblesparrow Yes, indeed!
Creators of a modern medium such as film, cannot have the ability to snap their fingers to find great, mature age-specific actors to play great, mature characters from a great, mature writer such as Miss Austen. Count your blessings. Of all the tries over the years, this film packs a wallop.
Not sure it's the talent that's lacking, rather the commitment to storytelling. Too much studio interference, etc. But I see your point. Don't know when we'll get another Rickman.
The way he repeats 'no doubt' though....
Yup. “Mrs Jennings can’t keep another person’s business to herself if her life depended upon it.”
Brandon kept his emotions in check. He could have easily exposed Willoughby.
And now, IRL Elinor and Willoghby have been married for 20 years. (Emma Thompson & Greg WIse)
They are so cute together. If I don't look like that with my husband in twenty years, I don't want to marry!
Alan Rickman and Emma Thompson were actor friends from decades before as they were starting out in their field as thespians, so great to see them acting together in Sense and Sensibility, as well as on the holiday film Love Actually. Thompson wrote the screenplay for Sense and Sensibility but never intended to act it the film, till the director encouraged her to take the role of the older sister. Such great casting. Ironically, Emma Thompson married actor Greg Wise, who played the role of the cad Willoughby in Sense and Sensibility.
0:55 begins my favorite part
Fabulous author
Where can I watch this
❤❤❤
Alan rickman❤
😮
I'm watching this movie as clips are being recommended.
Willoughby sucks
Acting classes with Emma Thompson and Alan Rickman
Wow, Marianne dodged a bullet. She thought she was engaged to a rich man, but he had just lost his fortune. Would SHE have wanted to gone through with the wedding if she knew he had lost his inheritance? For all her "sensibility," she was only ever attracted to very rich men.
I've always wondered if a Duel was not in the cards between Col. Brandon and Willoughby because of his treatment of Beth. And who would have won?
In the book Brandon tells Elinor that there was a duel, but as neither was wounded, nothing came of it.
@@charverz And it's even implied in a scene from the most recent version, the BBC mini series from 2008.
Setting the scene in the first minute. Hateful load of hypocrites. The easily swayed brother looks like the cartoon figure for The New Yorker magazine
What an extraordinary scene: an excellent actor hopelessly miscast and an actress who might do well in amdram but starring in a real movie???
You tried to fight hon, but no one here found you worthy.
Creations in modern times, as presented in a modern medium such as film, cannot always be rendered having found living extraordinary actors of the same age as characters in a great, mature classic novel. Who else could you cast, @huolalupin6008? Count your blessings, you ingrate!
@@maryezell3888 I am not going to reply to your incoherent comment because it is silly.
In what way were they miscast?
@huolalupin6008 Yawn….