Anne's Off for Adventure, But There's No Place Like Avonlea

After writing my review of Anne of Green Gables last week, I felt an urge to pull out Anne of Avonlea and watch that for the first time in years. The urge struck, oddly enough, around 11:30 at night, but I watched the second installment of Anne’s adventures without so much as a nod of the head. My rapt attention did not fade until the film ended after 3:00. When I finally succumbed to sleep, I had sweet dreams indeed.

I admit that due to the more youthful exploits chronicled in Anne of Green Gables, not to mention the idyllic locale and the presence of more beloved characters, especially Matthew, I prefer the original and return to it more often. But Anne of Avonlea is a beautiful work in its own right, showing us an Anne (Megan Follows) now teetering on the edge of adulthood and wishing that everything in her life could simply remain unchanged – a sentiment with which I can readily identify.

But numerous changes are in store for Anne, whether she welcomes them or not. Her best friend Diana (Schuyler Grant) accepts a marriage proposal from a young man whom Anne considers a most unsuitable suitor. “He’s very good,” Anne complains to an exasperated Marilla (Colleen Dewhurst), explaining that she would prefer a man who could be wicked if he wanted to be. Even more distressing than her changing relationship with Diana, however, are the affections of the steadfast Gilbert Blythe (Jonathan Crombie), who confesses what the audience has known all along: that he has loved her for as long as he can remember. Gilbert’s devotion to Anne is heartbreaking as she is convinced that an engagement to her old chum would simply not satisfy her adventurous whims.

What would satisfy them, for the time being at least, is the teaching position offered by her former instructor Miss Stacey (Marilyn Lightstone) at a prestigious school for girls in a town dominated by the aristocratic Pringle family. The numerous Pringles she encounters upon her arrival prove Anne’s greatest stumbling block, though icy headmistress Katherine Brooke (Rosemary Dunsmore) doesn’t do much to make her reception warmer. Here in this school setting, Anne must muster her deepest reserves of ingenuity to win over her defiant students. Her one kindred spirit, a girl named Emmeline Harris (Genevieve Appleton), is pulled out of school after a scuffle with Jen (Susannah Hoffman), the prissiest Pringle of all, and Anne must undertake a quest to become Emmeline’s personal tutor.

While I still am most enthralled by the goings-on in Avonlea, Anne’s new placement affords her many opportunities for excitement and gives her charm its greatest challenge yet. Emmeline is a winning new addition to the cast of characters, as are the members of her immediate family: her crusty grandmother (Wendy Hiller), timid aunt Pauline (Kate Lynch) and emotionally distant but soon-to-be-smitten father Morgan (Frank Converse). While Anne faces a host of hurdles in winning the approval of so many antagonistic townspeople, her greatest challenge comes when she actually succeeds and is forced to choose between a glamorous new life or the humble home she left behind.

With the exception of Richard Farnsworth, all the major supporting cast members who so enriched the first film are back in the second, though we see them far less than we’d like to. In spite of a number of amusing incidents later in the film, I find the beginning of the movie the funniest, punctuated by such landmark events as Anne winning the grand prize in a contest she didn’t enter and accidentally selling Rachel Lynde’s (Patricia Hamilton) cow to Gilbert’s father. Still, this is Anne’s time for self-discovery, and her lengthy absence only makes us appreciate Avonlea all the more when she returns after a year of hard work. Most of all, I think, we appreciate Gilbert, who in spite of his long absences from the screen provides the emotional core of the film. His earnestness and loyalty earn him a top slot in my list of all-time best fictional beaus, and Anne’s inevitable realization of her love for him, though initially devastating, ultimately leads to the most satisfying of conclusions.

While this is still a movie that can be appreciated by younger viewers, I would say the target audience is older this time. It is especially appropriate for viewers in their late adolescence or close friends or relatives of someone that age who are beginning to feel the pangs of empty nest syndrome. Anne of Avonlea is a story about change, but it also carries the message that the most important things remain constant, and in such turbulent times as one’s late teens always are, that is a very heartening reminder.