Little Women is a feature film directed by Greta Gerwig and co-starring Saoirse Ronan, Emma Watson, Florence Pogh, and Eliza Scanlon, which was released in the United States in 2019. Based on Louisa May Alcott's eponymous title**, the film tells the story of the lives of four sisters in an ordinary family in New England in the United States in the 19th century.
At the beginning of the film, Joe March (Saoirse Ronan) from Concord walks into the office of a newspaper with a manuscript she has written, and she is here to submit it. The editor-in-chief read the manuscript she wrote and made a lot of changes, and he was only willing to pay $20 for this **. Joe, who was eager to make money, sold the story she had worked so hard to write, and she was so excited that she rushed back to the youth hostel she rented. Joe stood by the fireplace and wrote**, her skirt was accidentally burned by the fire, but fortunately it was extinguished by others. Ignoring the scared Joe, he still has to go to teach the two children. All this because of her poor family background. In order to support her family, she had to leave home early and come to New York to make a living.
On the other side, Joe's fourth sister Amy (played by Florence Poe) is studying oil painting in the romantic capital of Paris, and she lives with her aunt. Amy meets Laurie, the grandson of neighbor Mr. Lawrence, who has proposed to Joe but she refuses. Amy invites Laurie to the New Year's ball, as does her betrothed Fred.
The camera cuts back to Concord in the United States, where the March family's eldest daughter, Meg (played by Emma Watson), is visiting a tailor shop with her best friend. She fell in love with expensive silk fabrics, and at the instigation of her best friend, she spent a huge sum of $50 to buy 20 yards of fabric. When she got home, Meg regretted it and felt that it was a waste to spend so much money on fabric for dresses. It turned out that she had been married a long time ago, her husband was a governess with no longevity, and a pair of children to raise, and the family's economy had been very tight.
Seven years ago, the three March sisters, Meg, Joe, and Amy, were preparing to go to the ball. Joe uses hot tongs to help Amy perm her hair, but accidentally burns off a lock of Amy's hair, and Amy has to go to the prom. The young and beautiful Meg became the center of the ball, and there was an endless stream of people asking her to dance, and Joe, who was average-looking, was very numerous. Trying to avoid embarrassment, Joe hides in a room and meets Laurie, who is also not fond of being boisterous. The two danced in the hallway and talked happily. Meg accidentally sprained her ankle and had to rub Laurie's carriage home.
Each of the four March sisters had dreams: Meg wanted to marry a rich man who could afford to hire a lot of servants so that she wouldn't have to do a lot of housework; Joe has loved writing since she was a child, and her dream is to become a writer who will make a name for herself and earn a lot of money to support her family; Beth (played by Eliza Scanlon), who has been frail and sickly since childhood, only hopes that the family will be safe, she is a good piano player, but because her family is poor, there is no piano to play; Amy wanted to be a painter in Paris, the kind of fame and fortune that would lead to fame and fortune. The four sisters have their own dreams, what will their future hold?
Christmas is here, and the four sisters are waiting in the house for their mother to come back and have a big meal together. While waiting, they rehearsed a script written by Joe and prepared to perform it for everyone to see. Mom had just returned home, and she had just gone to visit a family of six living in a cold cabin: a young mother and five sick children who were waiting to be fed. The mother decided to give them the prepared Christmas dinner, and the four sisters did so obediently, although they were unwilling, and they became "angels" to help the suffering. Just when they were worried that they would not have a big meal for Christmas, they were surprised to find that the table was full of all sorts of delicacies—much better than the ones they had given them—sent by their generous neighbor, Mr. Lawrence. He witnessed the family's good deeds and decided to surprise them.
The four March sisters had a single but wealthy aunt, and the old lady liked the unruly Joe the most. She told Joe that if a woman wants to live a good life, she can only rely on marrying a golden beetle son-in-law, and there is no other way. Because in those days, there weren't many job opportunities left for women. Maybe being an actress would be a good way out, but Qiao Zhi is not here, she is determined to find a way out by writing.
Amy was physically punished for drawing a portrait of her teacher in class, she didn't dare to go home, so she stood outside Laurie's house crying, and Laurie found her and asked her to come in and sit. Soon, Mom brings Meg and Joe to Amy, who are overwhelmed by the luxury of the Laurie family. There are a large collection of books, expensive oil paintings, and pianos, which satisfy all their imagination of a rich life.
The four sisters, Laurie and March, who have no playmates, have a good time, and he is attracted to Joe with a unique personality and confesses to him, only to be cruelly rejected by Joe, who is bent on making money. Heartbroken, Laurie travels to Europe and meets Amy in Paris. Amy, who is quite scheming, has always had a crush on Laurie, and Laurie is richer than her engaged boyfriend Fred, Amy takes the initiative and takes down Prince Charming. When the news of their marriage reached the house, it naturally caused a commotion, but Joe didn't care about it.
Just as Joe is gearing up for a career in New York, the sad news comes from home that Beth is seriously ill. Joe took the train home and saw Beth one last time. Meg marries Brooke, a poor governess, and lives an ordinary life. Amy successfully married into a wealthy family, and is still working the road of painting, wanting to become a famous artist. Joe wrote a book based on her four sisters, which became a bestseller, and she also inherited her aunt's big house and converted it into a school. In this way, the three sisters completed the transformation from a young girl to a little woman and realized their respective ideals.