What impresses me most about this book is how it nails that suburban boyhood mysticism of discovering girls. But the movie disappointed me, actually. For one thing, it reveals too much of what's going on inside the Lisbon house, which diminishes the mystery that drew me into the story.
As for that first-person plural you mentioned, I saw that again in Joshua Ferris' Then We Came to the End. It didn't add as much to that story as it does here, though.

In response to your #8 I'm just going to quote something I'd utter periodically when reading Tess: "Angel Clare, you stupid %*&$."
And being a guy, can I just ask about the appeal of Mr. Rochester? Are most ladies liking him in spite of his jerk qualities, or secretly, in part, because of them?

Ibsen really rocked the boat. We don't get that sense in his plays unless we consider the context. I grew to appreciate A Doll's House quite a bit after reading some other 19-century literature that was touted as feminist, particularly Chopin's The Awakening. See, here's a heroine who not only has the mettle to emancipate herself from a life that's not for her, but I don't see her admitting failure later and walking into the sea.
While I don't exactly enjoy Ibsen, I tend to like what he's doing.