Beautiful, funny, passionate, and calculating, Becky is the orphaned daughter of a starving English artist and a French chorus girl. She yearns for a more glamorous life than her birthright promises and resolves to conquer English society by any means possible. A mere ascension into the heights of society is simply not enough. So Becky finds a patron in the powerful Marquess of Steyne whose whims enable Becky to realise her dreams. But is the ultimate cost too high for her?
There is no depth beneath its bright surfaces, no potent emotional undercurrents.
– Richard Schickel,
TIME Magazine,
3 Sep 2004
fresh:
Witherspoon moves director Mira Nair's version of Thackeray's social satire forward at a good clip, making Becky's rising and falling fortunes an intensely watchable spectator sport.
– Michael O'Sullivan,
Washington Post,
3 Sep 2004
rotten:
Scene by scene and moment to moment, it's a woeful misreading of the book.
– Charles Taylor,
Salon.com,
4 Sep 2004
rotten:
A less than absorbing adaptation of Thackeray's sprawling but sharp-witted classic.
– Andrew Sarris,
New York Observer,
10 Sep 2004
rotten:
It's lavish but lulling, and at two hours and 18 minutes, it's something of a bore.