Emma Thompson and Kate Winslet shine as Jane Austen heroines that endeavor to maintain their composure while swooning over the highly eligible swains Hugh Grant and Alan Rickman. Please don’t tell us that nobody got along on this production, because the result seems all so pleasant. Emma Thompson’s adaptation could hardly be improved, and Ang Lee’s gentle direction is exemplary, and. This 1812 version of a modern pop romance still works because we can identify with Austen’s vivid characters; a terrific production doesn’t hurt either.

Sense and Sensibility
4K Ultra HD only + Digital
Sony
1995 / Color / 1:85 widescreen / 136 min. / Street Date August 19, 2025 / Available from Moviezyng / 30.99
Starring: Emma Thompson, Kate Winslet, Gemma Jones, Tom Wilkinson, Hugh Grant, Alan Rickman, Greg Wise, Lucy Steele, Harriet Walter, Imelda Staunton, Emilie François, Robert Hardy, Hugh Laurie.
Cinematography: Michael Coulter
Production Designer: Luciana Arrighi
Art Directors: Andrew Sanders, Philip Elton
Costume Design: Jenny Bevan, John Bright
Film Editor: Tim Squyres
Composer: Patrick Doyle
Screenplay Written by Emma Thompson
Executive Producer Sydney Pollack
Produced by Lindsay Doran
Directed by Ang Lee

Some 4K discs just don’t show the improvement over Blu-ray, something that is to be expected when dealing with vintage movies that might have less than perfect film elements to work with. But then you’ll put in something like this new Sony encoding, and see the difference immediately.

The appeal of Jane Austen stories never seems to fade, although some of her stories get more attention than others. The one most often reconfigured is Pride and Prejudice, but equally pleasant is a pastoral romance first published in 1811. For the moment at least, a 1995 production persists as the ‘best accepted’ movie take on Jane Austen’s Elinor Dashwood, the most deserving heroine of them all.

This handsome, thoughtful replay of Sense and Sensibility was a labor of love by actress Emma Thompson. How many actors get to be in charge of a story they really want to make, and play the leading role as well?  Quite a few, of course, but not that many were as up to the challenge. Ms. Thompson earned an Oscar for her writing plus an acting nomination. The picture also attracted nominations for cinematography, costumes, and music, and for its producer Lindsay Doran and co-star Kate Winslet. Thompson’s stardom had already been established in the James Ivory films Howards End and The Remains of the Day. If I’m not mistaken, in 1995 the pre-  Titanic Kate Winslet was still mainly known as one of the dizzy, murderous Australian teens in Peter Jackson’s Heavenly Creatures. This version of Sense and Sensibility earns high marks for achievement.

With the death of Mr. Dashwood (Tom Wilkinson), the female Dashwoods of Norland Hall suffer a steep drop of status in English society. Encouraged by his venal wife Fanny (Harriet Walter), son and heir John Dashwood (James Fleet) puts Elinor, Marianne, Margaret and their mother (Emma Thompson, Kate Winslet, Gemma Jones & Emilie François) on a tiny pension, and evicts them from the family home. The four women accept the charity of their relatives the Middletons of Devonshire. As daughters without dowries, Elinor and Marianne lack the best prospects for marriage, but Marianne soon attracts two suitors, the reserved Colonel Brandon (Alan Rickman) and the dashing John Willoughby (Greg Wise). Elinor and aspiring vicar Edward Ferrars (Hugh Grant) form an affectionate bond, but the relationship is curtailed by Fanny’s vindictive machinations. Elinor gives up entirely when a new arrival, Lucy Steele (Imogen Stubbs), tells her in confidence that she and Edward have been engaged for five years. Then Marianne’s relationship with John Willoughby collapses in scandal and mystery, which throws the girl into an emotional depression. Elinor is willing to accept what comes, but the social snubs and snobberies amount to a steady diet of humiliations.

Yes, Austen’s formula for brilliant popular literature can’t be beat. Now as then, romance and intrigue across social and economic barriers is of universal interest. Males inherit property and females do not, which reduces a family from respectable status to something akin to cultured beggars. The Dashwoods are at the mercy of boorish relatives, some of whom mean well, and others that act out of pure malice. Money is used to assert a social dominance, and also to force people to one’s will. Austen places her characters on the moral incline depending on what guides their lives. Fanny wants to control her husband’s money and doesn’t care who suffers. John Willoughby isn’t about to marry for love and be required to work for a living. Edward Ferrars isn’t interested in money, but he still needs a sponsor to have a parish of his own. Elinor and Marianne just want to find men they like, and maintain some level of respectability.

Quite beautiful yet no man-killer, Emma Thompson is an ideal Austen heroine, the one who must prove her worth by staying civil and ladylike while enduring various social slights and injuries. This is 1813, after all, and women are supposed to wait, not assert themselves. Austen’s books give their readers hope that by emulating the virtuous Elinor, they’ll be happy too. The romantically-inclined reader wasn’t disappointed, as Ms. Austen confects felicitous endings that are just too good for real life. It’s called giving the reader what they want. While waiting for Mr. Right, they have some great books to read.

The novelty of character over mere beauty also gives us Kate Winslet, an actress seemingly born to portray women from period fiction. Her Marianne throws herself far too boldly at John Willoughby, a choice that can only lead to disaster. Then Marianne must weather a sickness that helps to externalize her emotional distress. Of course, the recovery period creates an opening for that handsome Colonel Brandon to notice Marianne. And imagine that, the quiet Brandon reveals a passionate interest in poetry that appeals greatly to Marianne.

The Dashwood women are presented as disadvantaged, but an eligible dreamboat suitor is never more than a chapter away. The hard work is sorting out which men are rotten eggs, and which is the unassertive introvert that hides a heart of gold. Does Austen customize her men for female wish fulfillment?  Not one of these admiring swains is a fat-gutted beer drinker who tracks mud in the house or lets the hounds eat off the dinner table. As if to compensate, Austen throws in one male relative who’s always sarcastic and bored, and openly contemptuous of his pea-brained, loud-mouthed wife. He doesn’t even have an interest in children. We love that guy.

Thompson’s adaptation captures the essence of most of the characters, and the performance-enhancing direction of Ang Lee (Ride with the Devil) works out the delicate balance necessary for our understanding of the social strait-jacket in which these people function. The various biddies and gossips that plague the Dashwoods can serve as comedy relief. The Dashwoods’ kin resemble the real relatives we all must endure, the kind that are hilarious only if they’re somebody else’s relatives. And the truth be told, nobody can make the story’s coincidences, mistaken assumptions and near miraculous serendipities seem like anything but what they are. Thompson and Lee instead make us believe in the characters’ surprise.

The obligatory ‘happy faces and wedding cakes’ finish deals out justice in proper measure to all concerned. Thompson does opt to end on a note of sympathy for John Willoughby, whose choice will bar him from the story’s definition of True Happiness. This seems a tad forced, as we’ve no indication that Willoughby is anything more than shallow and selfish. Was he more sympathetic in the book? I’ll bet that Ms. Austen was reacting to the average romance novel of her time, where the most handsome and dashing stud in the county is also a true-blue Prince Charming. Don’t trust men with long sideburns.

Some Austen film adaptations cheat on the fashion era, to give the ladies more attractive costumes. Dresses true to the period had high  Empire waistlines. The style made most women look like shapeless bags. Did they compensate with cleavage to give men something to look at?  According to the IMDB the costumes seen in this movie were all re-used in, or repurposed from, four or five other period movies of the day. How does one get an Oscar nomination for borrowed costumes, though?  The movie may have been inexpensive — not too many big party scenes — but we see some pretty impressive locations. Those green hills and trees roll on forever.

Alan Rickman erases his Die Hard villainy to play the cautious, sensitive Colonel Brandon. Hugh Grant’s vicar is the kind of hesitant, shy sweetheart that needs a woman like Elinor to draw out his personality. That gag will work until he’s arrested going wild on Hollywood Blvd. Greg Wise mainly looks like a ladykiller’s ladykiller. The peripheral casting is exceptionally good: Gemma Jones (Ken Russell’s The Devils), Harriet Walter (The Good Father), Robert Hardy (The Spy Who Came in from the Cold), Imelda Staunton (Vera Drake), Imogen Stubbs (Nanou), Richard Lumsden, Hugh Laurie (Tomorrowland).

Sony’s 4K Ultra HD of Sense and Sensibility is two hours of genteel drama in the bucolic green English countryside. Rendered in full 4K, it basically looks better than it did in theaters. Sony’s remastering effort brings out colors and textures we didn’t know were there. We wonder how the filmmakers decided on the makeup design for these early 19th-century women. They have great complexions and pink cheeks and look entirely natural. How much makeup are the actresses wearing?

So many studio 4Ks have included bonus Blu-rays that we’ve grown to expect them. Be forewarned that this 4K package contains just the one 4K disc, and nothing for the other format.

An insert card with a code for a Digital version is included as well.

We remember the excellent Twilight Time disc from 2015; this release retains all the extras from previous studio editions, save for Twilight Time’s Isolated Music track, and Emma Thompson’s Golden Globe Acceptance Speech. Writer-actor Thompson and producer Lindsay Doran share an audio commentary, with Ang Lee and another producer on the other. The somewhat promotional-oriented featurettes cover the Jane Austen craze, the costumes, the director and the production. The deleted scenes include a very flat Elinor-Edward kiss that was wisely discarded.

Reviewed by Glenn Erickson

Sense and Sensibility
4K Ultra HD rates:
Movie: Excellent
Video: Excellent
Sound: Excellent English 5.0; French 5.0; English 7.1.4; Spanish DS
Supplements:
2 commentaries:
— actress Emma Thompson + producer Lindsay Doran
— director Ang Lee + co-producer James Schamus
featurettes:
25th Anniversary Reunion, back to Barton College
Adapting Austen
Elegance & Simplicity: The Wardrobe of Sense and Sensibility
Locating the World of Sense and Sensibility
A Sense of Character
A Very Quiet Man
Deleted Scenes
Original Theatrical Trailer.
Deaf and Hearing-impaired Friendly? YES; Subtitles: English (feature only)
Packaging: One 4K Ultra HD in Keep case
Reviewed: August 24, 2025
(7382sens)

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