
Sept. 8-10, 2011
74. Anne of Green Gables: The Sequel (1987) [a.k.a. Anne of Avonlea]—REWATCH
Starring Megan Follows, Colleen Dewhurst, Wendy Hiller, Frank Converse, Jonathan Crombie
Directed by Kevin Sullivan
Plot: “Staying faithful to L.M. Montgomery's beloved books, this continuation of the award-winning miniseries picks up where the first installment left off, with redheaded heroine Anne Shirley (Megan Follows) beginning a new life as a teacher and an aspiring writer. She also encounters career hurdles and unfriendly townsfolk, but with her typical enthusiasm and good cheer.” (Summary from Netflix)
That first line of the summary above is actually wrong—this movie does not stay “faithful to L.M. Montgomery’s beloved books.” According to Wikipedia:
“When Kevin Sullivan was commissioned by CBC, PBS and The Disney Channel to create a sequel he started by combining many different elements of Montgomery’s three later books: Anne of Avonlea (1909), Anne of the Island (1915), and Anne of Windy Poplars (1936) into a cohesive screen story. Sullivan invented his own plotline relying on several of Montgomery’s episodic storylines spread across the three sequels, He also looked at numerous other nineteenth century female authors for inspiration in fleshing out the screen story.”And IMDb:
“Though the American title is ‘Anne of Avonlea’, it is only partially based on that Lucy Maud Montgomery book (second in the series), and is in fact based on parts from books 2-4 in the series (out of 8). This was because Kevin Sullivan thought there wasn't ‘enough dramatic material for a film’ in the sequel ‘Anne of Avonlea’ alone.”My point is that this sequel is not entirely faithful to the books…but it is still a wonderful movie. However, I basically grew up watching the two Anne films over-and-over. So I might be a bit biased by sentimental reasons.
This is almost embarrassing to admit, but before watching this the other day (probably the 164th time I've seen it) and doing a little Googling, I NEVER knew that this wasn't strictly based on the second novel! You see, I have read all of the Anne books except the first two. Back then I was young[er] and stupid[er] and thought since I had seen the movies that the books would be boring. Thus I never knew that the plot of this movie wasn't true to the book.
Clearly I need to read/reread the series very soon (it's been years since I first read them). Still a great movie, but I'm kind of a literary purist about some of these things. I wish that they would've followed the books more carefully and made future movies based on them (please, let's not even talk about the third movie—*shudder*—and that ghastly 'prequel' which I refuse to see). Part of me wishes for a remake of this series which follows the book more. But…I just have a hard time thinking that anyone else can play Anne, Marilla, Matthew, Rachel, Diana, etc. quite like this cast did.
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{Click image for source} Is it just me or is Anne's hair not RED enough? |
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Love this picture |
The rest of the cast is virtually perfect. Colleen Dewhurst as Marilla is wonderful, and Wendy Hiller is amusing in her scenery-chewing role (“drrrrenched”). I also really enjoyed the plot development of Katherine Brooke. Her character gets some fantastically quotable lines. For example: “What is to be the pill in all this jam, Miss Shirley?” and “Have you girls no propriety? This is not a Turkish bazaar!”