We were at least 20 or 30 minutes into the new film version of “Little Women” before Jo uttered the famous first line: “Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents.” But the disjointed telling of Louisa May Alcott’s tale is one of my few quibbles with this lovely new movie.

What a moral world Louisa May Alcott has created for us in Little Women, and what a fulsome rendition of it director Greta Gerwig has brought to life in this new adaptation. Seeing it with one of my own “little women,” I thought about the world it evokes and the world she and her sisters inhabit — a world where personal sacrifices seem as out of place as dance cards and turned collars.

I devoured Alcott books as a girl and took their lessons to heart. They are simple and old-fashioned — be kind, work hard, think of others and not just yourself — but as difficult to follow now as they were then. It’s not as if the modern world doesn’t celebrate these virtues too, but the concept of self-improvement, that we are pilgrims on a moral journey, often seems lost in bits and bytes and likes.

Being immersed in an earlier time for two hours, albeit glamorized and spit-polished, made me realize what we have lost. It is much indeed.


(Photo: “Little Women,” Sony Pictures)