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William Makepeace Thackeray's novel Vanity Fair (1847 - 1848) has been the subject of numerous television and film adaptations. Vanity Fair is a 2004drama/romance film, directed by Mira Nair. This version made substantial changes, including a happy ending (see Thackeray article for plot summary). It stars Reese Witherspoon as Becky Sharp.

The film was nominated for "Golden Lion" Award in 2004 Venice Film Festival.

Cast

• Reese Witherspoon - Rebecca 'Becky' Sharp Crawley
• Angelica Mandy - Young Rebecca 'Becky' Sharp
• Romola Garai - Amelia Sedley Osborne
• James Purefoy - Colonel Rawdon Crawley
• Jonathan Rhys Meyers - George Henry Osborne
• Rhys Ifans - Major William Dobbin
• Eileen Atkins - Miss Matilda Crawley
• Geraldine McEwan - Lady Southdown
• Gabriel Byrne - Marquess of Steyne
• Kelly Hunter - Lady Steyne
• Bob Hoskins - Sir Pitt Crawley Sr.
• Douglas Hodge - Pitt Crawley Jr.
• Natasha Little - Lady Jane Sheepshanks Crawley
• Jim Broadbent - Mr. Osborne
• Tony Maudsley - Joseph 'Jos' Sedley
• John Franklyn-Robbins - Mr. Sedley
• Deborah Findlay - Mrs. Mary Sedley
• Barbara Leigh-Hunt - Lady Bareacres
• Tom Sturridge - Young Georgy
• Kathryn Drysdale - Rhoda Swartz
• Angelaca Maicy - Monica Shwartz
• Robert Pattinson - Rawdy Crawley

Plot

The British Empire flowers; exotic India colors English imaginations. Becky Sharp, the orphaned daughter of a painter and a singer, leaves a home for girls to be a governess, armed with pluck, a keen wit, good looks, fluent French, and an eye for social advancement. Society tries its best to keep her from climbing. An episodic narrative follows her for 20 years, through marriage, Napoleonic wars, a child, loyalty to a school friend, the vicissitudes of the family whose daughters she instructed, and attention from a bored marquess who collected her father's paintings. Honesty tempers her schemes. No aristocrat she, nor bourgeois, just spirited, intelligent, and irrepressible.

Reception

Critics gave the film mixed reviews. Metacritic reported the film had an average score of 53 out of 100, based on 41 reviews.

Stephen Hunter of the Washington Post gave positive review, calling the movie "Mira Nair's fine movie version of the 1848 book, in all its glory and scope and wit."In the Charlotte Observer, Lawrence Toppman commented that "The filmmakers have wisely retained the main structure of the book" and that "The cast is uniformly good, even when dealing with sudden mood changes forced by the screenwriters' need to move forward." Meanwhile, Lisa Schwarzbaum, in her review in Entertainment Weekly, rated the film a B-, and added that the film "borders on perky — a duller, safer tonal choice for the story of a conniving go-getter whose fall is as precipitous as her rise."