Indeed, this 1983 version is "dated" as are other BBC/ITV productions of the time -- this is especially notable when compared to, for example, the Keira Knightley-version of "Pride & Prejudice," which is lush and beautifully shot.
However, this mini-series has the luxury of time (as it is episodic) and is able to convey the finer points of the novel missed in director Patricia Rozema's 1999's "deconstructed" version and the lively (but far less faithful) 2007 Billie Piper version (in which very pretty and likable, but inconceivably blonde-haired and dark-browed, Piper is constantly running and giggling throughout the Bertram estate).
Three sisters have married. Mrs. Price married for love, to an uneducated and poor naval fellow, and has borne him eight children, and they live in squalor, in Portsmouth. Her sister, Mrs. Norris, married a clergyman and they live on or near the estate of yet another sister, Lady Bertram, who, in turn, has married very well, and has four children, two boys, Tom and Edmund and two girls, Maria and Julia with her husband, a baronet, Lord Bertram.
Mrs. Norris -- for reasons not entirely clear, although likely to give the appearance of having a charitable nature -- has convinced her wealthy brother-in-law and sister to take in their unfortunate sister's oldest daughter, Fanny. Fanny grows up at Mansfield Park, always aware she's the family's "poor relation." Her affection for her cousin Edmund is at the core of Austen's love story.
The acting in the mini-series is really excellent and Sylvestra LeTouzel is really Fanny, as Austen describes her in the original novel. LeTouzel is actually quite beautiful, fragile and yet resilient.
Anna Massey's Mrs. Norris, too, embodies Austen's Mrs. Norris, without being so overtly hostile, from start to finish, as Maggie O'Neill's, in the 2007 version. Massey's role is much more substantial than future Mrs. Norris's are given and she is well up to the task. Villainy is much more credible when it is more cloying and subtle as Massey plays her.
There's a good deal of hostility towards Anna Pleasence's performance as Lady Bertram, and, unfortunately, I must jump on that bandwagon, too.
I love Jemma Redgrave's Lady Bertram in the 2007 version, although Redgrave's Lady Bertram is probably a good deal more observant and present than Austen's Lady Bertram.
Pleasence's performance, whether a personal acting choice, or one dictated by the director, is a challenge to watch, as it pulls the viewer out of story. It's simply odd. Her delivery consists of an extremely affected high-pitched voice and thumb-sucking (yes, really!). Some have mentioned her Lady Bertram seems medicated, but she actually comes across as touched/special/mentally deficient, and it defies credulity that Lord Bertram would marry her and that she would subsequently be running an estate like Mansfield Park (although the argument might be that Mrs. Norris does a good deal of the "running," with Lady Bertram as merely a figure head.
Pleasence's vocal stylings are reminiscent of Shirley Henderson's as "Moaning Myrtle" in "Harry Potter," but without Myrtle's wit and passion.
Christopher Villiers and Jackie Smith-Wood, as Tom Bertram and Mary Crawford, are very, very good, and, like Massey's Mrs. Norris and LeTouzel's Fanny, offer up performances that are clearly what Austen intended for the characters.
Samantha Bond, as Maria Bertram Rushworth, is very pretty and excellent and does offer up a hint of what she'll bring 30 years later to "Downton Abbey."
This is probably not a story for everyone, but essential for an Austen fan.
