source: Jane Eyre

Jane Eyre_ is one of the greatest novels in the English language and this screenwriter should of read it. I hate it when writers use Spark notes for what a novel is all about. This movie is unbearable to watch if you have read the book. The whole 'red room' is so down played that I wonder why they even bother to put it in. In the book the 'red room' is foreshadowing for the WHOLE story and the rest of Jane's life. Helen Burns is treated so badly in the movie I'm sure she was happy to die and leave early. In the book she is one of the most compelling characters and she was not the red head. The whole Christian theme is missing from her life and the rest of the movie. Do yourself a favor and miss this movie and read the story as Charlotte Bronte masterfully told it.

Zeffirelli´s version of Jane Eyre is the most touching movie,I´ve ever seen.....Hurt is BRILLIANT AS USUAL and just PERFECT as Mr.Rochester!....his facial expression is superb......I don´t care what the critics say. This film is,and will always be,my favourite! :-)))

I have seen quite a few adaptations of Jane Eyre, but I have never seen one that I loved this much. There are a few things that I would not have changed about the book, but one must realize that Film does not read the same way as a book. I think that William Hurt's portrayal of Rochester was astonishing. Some have called it a "wooden" portrayal. I think that is exactly the way that Rochester SHOULD be. He is a man hurt by so many disappointments through life that he is afraid to love and to feel. In the scene with Adele when she says that Jane may never come back and Rochester hesitates to comfort her, I think that Hurt's acting choices showed great insight to the character. Bravo, I say!!

If you have read the book , do not watch this movie! It will ruin your perception of it forever. There is no chemistry whatsoever and William Hurt (though I am a big fan!)is in no way credible as an Englishman . All sorts of important features of the book are left out in this movie. Even very special interactions between Jane and Rochester!! Entire characters are deleted , and it gets worse. Jane struggle after leaving Thornfield is gone. No mention of her finding her relatives , no , they pop up earlier in a most incredulous place , where they certainly shouldn't be. They even made up things of their own and put it in! As if this story needed "improvement". Conclusion:I have no idea what they wanted to achieve making this movie. I have found it to be very disappointing and it may very well have distorted my pleasure in reading a most excellent book , for ever!!

I think that too many people overlook the great acting done by William Hurt in Jane Eyre. I had seen several of his earlier films, and thought that he was an overly dramatic actor; however, the role of Mr. Rochester was a perfect fit for him. He did such a great job of showing both the undesirable and tender sides of his character! He did so with such finesse that he helped to make the girl who played Jane seem to be better suited to the role than she was.(That garden scene when he proposes is done so well and seemed so real-it takes a terrific actor to really pull that off as well as he did.) And he looked so handsome, too. I also liked the ending-he seemed so believably sad until Jane rescues him. I'm not sure about the adaptation aspect or not-I was too entranced by William Hurt's performance.

This version is pretty insipid, I'm afraid. Jane Eyre is one of my favorite books and has been since childhood, but William Hurt's weary, throwaway acting style is completely unsuitable to the bold passion of Edward Rochester and poor Charlotte Gainsbrough looks like a bored, petulant teenager whose dental braces hurt! I also can't believe that they eliminated Edward's great marriage proposal scene from the end of the book, one of the most moving moments in literature. I do appreciate that they finally used such a young, plain woman to play Jane, a character who is supposed to be a worldly 18, but if you want to see a version that closer approximates the personalities and passions of the novel, please see the 70's version with George C. Scott and Susannah York. York was too old, tall and pretty to play Jane, but no one has touched Rochester's character the way that Scott did.

I saw the movie before I read the book. Usually this means that you prefer one of them, but in this case I like them both as they are. When a novel is filmed, the result will be a kind of summary and hopefully the people that have written the film version have stayed close to the original. This is not always the case. Walt Disney versions of Peter Pan for example, have very little to do with J.M. Barry's original. Jane Eyre is a very serene, rather melancholical book with beautiful strong characters. The movie has the same quiet atmosphere and the casting of the actors is superbe. The only pity is that the movie is rather short. So see the movie and read the book!

I've seen 3 versions of this movie after having read Charlotte Bronte's book. The first was with Orson Wells as Mr. Rochester, the second with Ciaran Hinds, followed by William Hurt's version. Hurt's Rochester is the only one who didn't bring tears to my eyes. He is a wonderful actor, but it's as if this part was not suited to him. Mr. Rochester is a man of passion, pain, and jealousy; none of which were reflected in this story. The story is great, the actors are great, but story and actors are mismatched in this film. Another disservice is the failure of the movie to maintain the integrity of the book. Jane leaves Thornefield twice; once on the death of her aunt, and once again when left at the alter. In Bronte's book, Jane's travels and subsequent proposal of marriage after being left at the alter are somewhat cumbersome, but necessary to support her final return to Rochester, being willing to be with him under any terms. Unfortunately, these adventures are apparently difficult to incorporate into a film. Charlotte Gainsbourg's performance is the only one I've seen, and I'm anxious to follow her career. She seems to have the ability to well play suppressed emotion.

Having read the novel before seeing this film, I was enormously disappointed by the wooden acting and the arrogance of the producers in their blatant disregard of the plot. I feel this film in no way reflects the brilliance of Bronte's work, and rather gave the impression of a shallow love story. In the condensing of the film to a short 2hours, the film lost many of the key features which make the book comprehendable and progressional, thus resulting in a somewhat jumpy plot with little grounding. There is no build up to the romance between Rochester and Jane Eyre, so this appears rather abrupt and unfounded since the two characters have such infrequent interaction you cannot help but imagine their 'love' is superficial. This is such an injustice to Bronte's novel;you are given no impression of Jane's quirky cheek and boldness which attracts Rochester to her, and his arrogance which attracts Jane to him. Despite to poor scripting, I think that a few of the characters were portrayed very astutely, namely Mrs Fairfax and Grace Poole, however overall the production was poor. Given a better scripting, perhaps the film would have been more successful. See "Jane Eyre" (1970) with Zelah Clarke and Timothy Dalton for an outstanding production.