Middlemarch
|
List Price: Our Price: $6.76 You Save: $8.18 (55%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $6.45 (click here) Category: DVD See more DVD releases |
|---|
Buy this DVD movie at online store in your country
Canada
Canada
Movie Reviews of Middlemarch
Movie Review: What a pleasure!
Summary: 5 Stars
I purchased Middlemarch because I had heard it was a good period piece. I was not disappointed; in fact, the mini-series exceeded my expectations by a good measure.
I'll confess right off that I've never read the book. However, I assume it follows pretty closely because the screenplay was written by the ever-reliable Andrew Davies (who also penned the superb 1995 definitive version of Pride and Prejudice, as well as many other films of Austen's novels). The film deftly blends multiple story lines and never loses track of any of them.
The main story line is that of the very bright Dorothea Brooke, played in an understated way by the lovely Juliet Aubrey. Dorothea is a young niece of the aristocratic Arthur Brooke (the always excellent Robert Hardy), who is painfully, but cheerfully trying to make the transition from the late-feudal Britain to a country marked by the rise of popular democracy.
Dorothea is attracted to men of intelligence and ideas. She is drawn to the much older scholar Rev. Edward Casaubon, who is engaged in an exhaustive study of mythology. He has spent copious amounts of time researching his subject, but little actual writing. Dorothea (or Dodo, as her sister Celia has dubbed her) yearns for a 'soulful life', though her sister doesn't see the attraction, nor for that matter does the rest of the family, including her father. Sir James Chettam, a family friend, who is wealthy and much interested in Dorothea's attractiveness as well as her intelligence, seems a much better choice, as he is closer to her age. But Dorothea is undaunted. She is excited by the idea of helping Dr. Casaubon in his study, and, at first, so is he. So, they marry.
All is not plum perfection in the new relationship, though, primarily once Rev. Casaubon's moody, restless cousin Will Ladislaw shows up. There is an instant attraction between Dorothea and Will, that is evident to everyone including Casaubon.
Meanwhile, Dr. Tertius Lydgate has arrived in Middlemarch (a fictitious town set in the Midlands of England in the mid-19th century, placing it between Jane Austen and Charles Dickens). He has ambition, and seeks to improve the medical profession and health care in the England that is removed from the big cities such as London. He has decided to remain a bachelor for the time being, though there is pressure on him to settle down in short order. One of the young ladies he is acquainted with is the pretty, but vacuous Rosamond Vincy, who is the niece of the pompous, dictatorial, but very rich Mr. Bulstrode, who is in charge of a group of city elders who control much of what goes on in Middlemarch. Rosamond is smitten by Dr. Lydgate, who is handsome, intelligent, but poor. Rosie, and Dr. Lydgate calls her, has misunderstood Dr. Lydgate's attentions to mean that he means to marry her. When he explains to her that he has had no such intention, she becomes hysterical and cries unceasingly. To calm her, Dr. Lydgate promises to marry her, a promise that will lead to much regret on his part.
It's a film with a multitude of plot lines, as the above description hints at, but the George Eliot (and Davies) pulls it off well, and the whole remains cohesive and neatly wrapped up in the end.
This really is a must-see for those who love Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, or the Bronte sisters. It's one of the best period pieces set in the 18th and 19th century England.
Not to be missed; I loved it. Very highly recommended!
Movie Review: Not exactly like Elliot's book, but excellent anyway.....
Summary: 5 Stars
MIDDLEMARCH, the film, is not exactly faithful to the book of the same name. Although most folks will appreciate the depiction of this tale, I recommend you read the book. The film would have you believe that Ms Brooke fell in love with Will Ladislaw the first time she saw him, but the book makes it clear that although Ladislaw loved Dorothea from early on, Dorothea (played bu the wonderful Juliet Aubrey) had no such notions and loved only her husband, the narrow Causabon (Patrick Malahide).
MIDDLEMARCH is a tragedy. Dorothea's greatest wish, that her life have meaning is denied her. First, she falls in love with a clergyman much older than herself and marries him against the wishes of many family members and friends. Then she gives up the estate she inherits when he dies, and with which she could have done much good. She is forced to do this because he has left a stipulation in his will that she forfeit everything should she marry his nephew (impoverished by the actions of Causabon's family).
Dorothea Brooke marries Causabon with the hope of assisting him in the development of his work entitled "The Key to All Mythology", an ambitions undertaking reminiscent of `The Golden Bough' developed by Sir James Frazier around the turn of the century (19th-20th). However, Causabon holds an attitude typical of his times - he believes women are not capable of scholarly pursuits. It is only when he is near the end of his own life, with his health failing, that he allows Dorothea to read to him and translate sections of the Latin texts, but it is too late.
When she marries Will Ladislaw, Elliot (voice of Judy Dench) tells us of Dorothea, "Her full nature, like that river of which Cyrus broke the strength, spent itself in channels which had no great name on earth. But the effect of her being around those around her was incalculably diffusive: for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs."
Dorothea's counterpart (MIDDLEMARCH is two books) is Doctor Lydgate, filled with noble aspirations which are laid in the dust by the profligate spending of his adored young wife. Lydgate wants to conduct research on Typhus and Cholera, and help the poor and ill with a new hospital dedicated to their needs. Dorothea wants to help him, but when she loses her fortune, their plans are lost and Lydgate must move to London and take up work that supports the lifestyle his ambitious and overweening wife clearly desires.
Acorn's DVD version of the film is well done, although not remastered ( I finally parted with my old tapes). The shots in England and Rome are much deteriorated since the early 1980s, so it may be worth owing the DVD if for no other reason than to have an idea of how Rome looked before automotive exhaust and ribbons of highway destroyed areas that had stood for thousands of years.
George Elliot was Mary Ann Evans, and Evans was a contemporary of Hardy. Both followed in the footsteps of Dickens and took up the cause of the folks disenfranchised by the Enclosure Acts, and in Elliot's case--the plight of women. This classic speaks to our times.
Movie Review: Eliot's epic turned into stunning BBC series drama
Summary: 5 Stars
George Eliot has always been among my favorite authors, and "Middlemarch" is without a doubt her masterpiece. Given the multitude of characters, plot complexity and psychological depth of the book, I feared that "Middlemarch" would never be made into a successful film. That entire plots would be dropped in the interest of time, or the whole of it so neatly packaged as to render it a mere shadow.
Yet in this six-episode, seven-hour series, BBC has created a vivid, authentic distillation of one of the greatest novels of the 19th century. Casting is superb-- particularly the luminous Juliet Aubrey as the quietly passionate, idealistic Dorothea Brooke, and the marvelous Rachel Power as pragmatic Mary Garth.
All the residents of Middlemarch come to full-blooded life in this remarkable adaptation of what is indeed a milestone of fiction-- a social drama with an edge of Austen parody, but with little of her sentimentality. Eliot was far too much of an intellectual, and in Middlemarch, she establishes herself as the godmother of the modern 20th century novel.
Middlemarch is foremost a human drama of hypocrisy and foible, of ambition, success and failure. The spoils go to the victors, who aren't always worthy; and those meant to inherit the earth usually end little more than 6 feet of it. And yet, all too rarely, there are those who do find love and fulfillment in the guise of a soul mate.
Eliot wrote Middlemarch with her usual detachment, painting characters in broad and intimate strokes, but ultimately leaving the reader to pass judgment-- just as her characters do among each other. This perfectly crafted series takes a similar path, never insisting that we love or hate a character, but simply see them as products of their environments, bound intrinsically to their fates, and only with great courage breaking free of convention.
Movie Review: A Quality Experience
Summary: 5 Stars
To say that a series is a "BBC British period production" is to say that the film was crafted with the kind of care and skill that is the standard for making a Rolls Royce engine. You expect quality and you get quality. Whether you are watching a series based on Charles Dickens or George Eliot novels, the BBC gives you a memorable experience. Perhaps it is because England has cultivated such a splendid assortment of credible actors specializing in this genre. Perhaps it is the quality of the screen-writing, the cinematography, direction or some combination of everything. Whatever it is, the "union" label here means something.
Middlemarch is named after a town in England, just prior to the Industrial Revolution, when social unrest was causing the entrenched political structure to unravel, and people were looking towards upward mobility and questioning the entitlements of the landed aristocracy. A young, idealistic doctor, moves into this very staid town where for generations business has been conducted the same way, and the same elite families held sway. He dreams of cutting edge medical research (actually dissecting corpses) and devoting his services for free to a charity hospital. A young, idealistic young woman chafes at the societal restraints around her desire to help the poor, especially by building cottages. Though the two marry different people and there is no romantic link between them, they end up with lives very different from their ideals.
This is a six part series on DVD and time flies when you are watching it. There are many plots and sub-plots and characters, all of them interesting and most interrelated. Highly recommended.
Movie Review: Middlemarch is a beautiful BBC mini-series based on the classic George Eliot novel of 1871-72
Summary: 5 Stars
George Eliot (1819-1880) was a brilliant Victorian intellectual whose novels were written for adults. In this marvelous BBC series we see her words come to vibrant life!
Middlemarch unlocks the secrets of the inhabitants of a town
in the 1830s in the English Midlands. Industrialization in the
form of the railroad; the Reform Bill; the changes in the medical profession are all manifest in this series. Middlemarch is beautifully filmed with outstanding actors such as Juliet
Aubrey and Rufus Sewell makiing the characters come alive.
The story deals with three principal characters:
Dr. Lydgate who marries poorly and lives to regret it as he
courts and wins the shallow, vain and money grubbing Rosamund
Vincy.
Dorothea Brooks is the rich woman who marries a pedant but is
loved by his cousin Will Ladislaw.
Fred Vincy loves Mary Garth but has problems with gambling and
debt. Fred is the brother of Rosy.
The novel also delves into the unsavoury past of Mayor Nick
Bulstrode whose past is revealed by the visit of the awful Mr.
Raffles who knew him back when!
Middlemarch is seven hours long and first ran in the USA on
Masterpiece Theatre. The pace is leisurely and slow for many
American viewers used to quicker action. However, this BBC
adaption is well worth the time as it explores character in
depth; tells a classic tale with superb actors. The costuming
is realistic and accurate to the period. The music is dramatic
and the story told is classic.
I highly recommend this exquisite production! Excellent!