Without a clue: Growing-up stories of the 19th and 20th centuries

What youthful hubris and exuberance! “Clueless,” like Emma, is a social commentary about maturing, social class and privilege! Modeled on Jane Austen’s novel Emma of 1815, “Clueless” from 1995, offers a playful view of the human condition – growing toward maturity, lonely adults finding love, tangling and untangling convoluted feelings, and gaining a clear view of formerly misread relationships. Shakespeare would appreciate the laughter, tears, and human condition of “Clueless.”  In the story lines for “Clueless” and Emma, the protagonists are young women, in the later part of their teen years, entertaining themselves by matchmaking and otherwise interfering in others’ lives while thinking quite well of themselves.  Emma and Cher are light-hearted, a bit too self-satisfied, good-hearted if misguided, and have a lot to learn about themselves, other people, and social interactions and grace.

This contemporary version of Emma includes a motherless upper class teen girl, a gruff father, a teen with dull wit but appreciative heart and hidden talent (Travis), teen age capers to fumbling lovers, and even a bumbling robber.  All the while, the main characters, Cher and Josh circle closer and closer toward one another. The key that unlocks the door blocking their connection is Cher’s inveterate focus on the superficial – what looks good, gains attention and status, and, importantly, what keeps her in control and feeling safely ensconced in her position. 

 “Clueless” streamlines the plot to fit the time limits of a film and keeps the focus on teenage issues.  In fitting the story to film “Clueless” omits some of the characters from Austen’s novel.  Here is the film’s major character line up compared to the Austen novel:

·        Cher replaces Emma as the protagonist.  She is still the motherless daughter of a fairly ineffectual father; she alternately lovingly accommodates and manipulates her doting though distracted father.  She likes control and influence and appears bored if she doesn’t have some project or activity to stir her interest.  She does not prepare for school as Emma did not much care to read and improve herself through learning or self reflection. 

·        Dione fulfills the role of Mrs. Weston; the difference is that she is a peer not governess.

·        Tai is the contemporary for Austen’s Ms. Smith.  In the film, Tai’s accent pegs her as a working class girl going to school in upscale Los Angeles.  She becomes Cher’s ‘project’ as Ms. Smith was Emma’s.  Cher aims to improve Tai’s speech, looks, reputation and prospects, and ultimately instruct her how to present herself to get what she wants (well, what Cher wants for Tai).

·        Reverend Elton, the self-satisfied and self-aggrandizing rector becomes Elton the teenager who only wants to date girls that he considers his social equals and whom he likes, that is Cher and not Tai.

·        Frank is named Christian and he is gay, not a man with a hidden engagement; nevertheless, he is ‘hiding in plain sight.’  His parents divorced and he spends six months with each, unlike Frank who was stepson to Emma’s former governess (no governess in this story).

·        Josh replaces Mr. Knightley. He is Cher’s former step-brother, and as an ‘older’ male, Cher’s father considers him to be part of the family.  He balances loving Cher with a keen awareness of her flaws. He cannot escape chastising or at least challenging her worst behavior (with anticipation for better days).  Unlike Mr. Knightley, Josh is closer in age to Cher with only a few years difference (maybe 4 or 5?).  Josh is less polished and finished than Austen’s Mr. Knightley which makes him an acceptable love interest in contemporary thinking. 

·        Murray is boyfriend to Dione, Cher’s best friend.  (Replacing Mr. Weston of Austen’s novel).

·        The well-to-do farmer, Mr. Martin, becomes Travis, the skate-boarding outsider (in Cher’s judgment) who loves Tai for who she is as Cher finally realizes.   

The film impressively captures the essentials of Austen’s novel.  Like Emma, Cher begins to awaken to her thoughtless imposition of will on others. One example occurs when Cher’s ‘project’ (Tai) becomes self-confident after a scary and very public incident makes her the center of attention among the high school students.  Cher is dismayed to find herself dismissed by Tai who is now making her own social engagements that do not include Cher.  Finding herself no longer the adored, idolized center of Tai’s attention, Cher is left to wonder what has happened, paralleling Emma’s dismay in the novel when she confronts her own meanness to Miss Bates at the Box Hill picnic and realizes that she must attempt to make amends. 

Added to the film characters are two lonely, stereotyped middle-aged teachers that Cher and Dione connive to connect romantically.  Implausible as the scenarios are, the effort succeeds.  In a foreshadowing of the future for Cher and Josh, the two teachers wed before the film ends and Cher catches the bouquet.

One may find the film “Clueless” to be a thoroughly entertaining presentation of a classic tale of misguided meddling and social intrigues and of good succeeding over bad as Cher realizes how much she cares for Josh and Tai gains confidence and realizes she really likes Travis and not the boys Cher selected for her.  Viewing the film, one thinks of Virginia Woolf’s character, Mrs. Dalloway, who, delighted with the day and its events, says as she starts off one morning, “What a lark!”