Austenland

My mom and I went to see Austenland this week. It’s an indie movie, so it’s not playing everywhere, but if you can find it I recommend it. We got there a few minutes into the previews, but it was also dinner time, so we ordered food first. After several minutes, my mom told me to go into the theater while she waited on our sandwiches.

So I walked towards the ticket taker. The moment she saw me, she said, "You're in One Direction, theater 20." Then I handed her my ticket. "Nope, you're in Austenland, theater 18."

At first I thought it was funny. "Ha, take that, ticket woman! I don't fit into your stereotypical teenage molds! I watch classy movies!" I still think it's funny. But the more I thought about her assumption, the less I liked it. I've never had the ticket taker guess my movie before. There were 25 films playing. I could've been going to anything. Yes, the One Direction documentary is a teen movie. But so is City of Bones. So is Sea of Monsters.

Sea of Monsters

City of Bones

Wait, why am I captioning these? They have words.



 

And I'm not just a teenager. I'm a girl, so I watch chick flicks. I'm a Percy Jackson fan, so I watch Sea of Monsters. I'm a Pixar fan, so I watch Monster University. I'm a Shannon Hale fan, so I watch Austenland.

Shannon Hale is a New York Times Bestselling Author. She writes YA, or young adult. I highly recommend everything she’s written.

  

 

Austenland was her fifth book, the first one made specifically for adults. It’s not aimed at teenagers. All the actors in the movie are adults. Even when they flashback to Jane’s high school days, they don’t use a teenager. They smear make up on Keri Russell’s thirty seven year old face and expect we won’t know the difference.

But Hale’s still a YA author. So is Austenland’s executive producer. There’s plenty here that “appeals” to a teenage audience, but I don’t care about appeal. I’ll watch my kiddie movies and my adults movies and my teen movies, when Hollywood bothers to make them. I don't care what anyone in the movie industry thinks. Any movie can be my movie.

And there's nothing wrong with One Direction either.