Finally! Finally, a good romance at the movies once again! But why, why, why are all the good ones somehow related to Jane Austen? The last time I was overcome by something romantic on the big screen it was “Becoming Jane,” the fictionalized, imaginative envisioning of Jane Austen’s “real life” love life. This time, it’s “The Jane Austen Book Club,” which includes a very funny moment when one of the book club members, about to enter into an ilicit relationship with one of her high school students (!!), is barely saved from this indiscretion by imagining the words “What Would Jane Do” flashing in a “Don’t Walk” sign across the street from a motel where the hottie high school senior stands waiting.

Ah, Jane! She not only draws from us deep, romantic sighs and longing, but reminds us of the need for discretion, propriety, and a dash of ethics in all manner of situations.
This is one to see with your Austen-loving girlfriends. It is so clearly the stuff of women’s fantasy (especially since it stars, big sigh, Hugh Dancy and Jimmy Smits as romantic leads). What starts as an idea for an all-women Jane Austen-novel book club, turns, of course, into each member living out of one of Austen’s storied romances, not to mention the loves of these women’s lives falling in love with and reading Ms. Austen in the process.
If you haven’t already read the Karen Joy Fowler novel on which this film is based, it’s a quick read–you can finish it the night before you go.