This is an excellent British TV production of Thomas Hardy's classic novel. I watched it after I saw the updated version on A&E starring Ciaran Hinds (which is good too). This version is about 3 times as long and more true to the novel. Excellent acting and on location filming make this a winner. It's in a live play style. Its about a drunken husband who sells his wife and daughter to a sailor at a rural fair because he can't support them. Years later, this decision comes back to haunt him. Good morality story of how a bad decision can ruin people for life.
12 Reviews
Locations, quotations
malcolm-knott99923 June 2013
'Casterbridge' is Dorchester, not Oxford. You can still stand in the street in Dorchester where Michael Henchard's wife stood, opposite the hotel where he was holding court as the mayor.
Two lines stand out from this memorable movie, lines for which I suppose Thomas Hardy must take most of the credit.
Henchard's first words on meeting his wife after twenty years: 'I don't drink.'
And his wife's explanation, when speaking of the man who had bid five guineas for her and her baby at the fairground auction: 'I couldn't leave him, Michael. Not after he'd paid all that money for me.'
(Both quotes from memory, but I think they are accurate.)
Two lines stand out from this memorable movie, lines for which I suppose Thomas Hardy must take most of the credit.
Henchard's first words on meeting his wife after twenty years: 'I don't drink.'
And his wife's explanation, when speaking of the man who had bid five guineas for her and her baby at the fairground auction: 'I couldn't leave him, Michael. Not after he'd paid all that money for me.'
(Both quotes from memory, but I think they are accurate.)
a tragic hero in the dreaming spires
didi-511 March 2008
A thoughtful TV production, running over six hours, and a fine adaptation of Thomas Hardy's novel, arguably his best Wessex tale. Casterbridge stands for the real-life Oxford, a town where dreams can happen and a man such as Michael Henchard can rise as high as man can climb, and fall as far as man can sink. He is a tragic hero, a towering tour-de-force of good and evil, fearlessness and folly, and is beautifully played by Alan Bates in this version.
In support, Anne Stallybrass and Anna Massey shine the most, with Jack Galloway going some way to give life to the dour and ambitious Scot Farfrae, but stopping short of illuminating his complexities as set out in the book.
The music and the settings of this adaptation are excellent, and the atmosphere of a farm town, not yet touched by anything beyond industrialisation, is richly drawn. Slow-paced, but satisfying, this drama's reputation has grown steadily, and it is well deserved.
Interestingly, the adaptor of Hardy's book is none other than TV's infant terrible, Dennis Potter, and it is interesting to compare 'The Mayor of Casterbridge' with the likes of 'Pennies from Heaven' or 'The Singing Detective'.
In support, Anne Stallybrass and Anna Massey shine the most, with Jack Galloway going some way to give life to the dour and ambitious Scot Farfrae, but stopping short of illuminating his complexities as set out in the book.
The music and the settings of this adaptation are excellent, and the atmosphere of a farm town, not yet touched by anything beyond industrialisation, is richly drawn. Slow-paced, but satisfying, this drama's reputation has grown steadily, and it is well deserved.
Interestingly, the adaptor of Hardy's book is none other than TV's infant terrible, Dennis Potter, and it is interesting to compare 'The Mayor of Casterbridge' with the likes of 'Pennies from Heaven' or 'The Singing Detective'.
Smashing, stupendous, sensational
stancym4 December 2005
10 is not a high enough rating for this masterpiece. Even as we see the gorgeous and extremely talented Alan Bates as the mayor, making mistake after mistake, acting like a fool, struggling with his conscience, and sometimes making things right only to screw up again, we are moved by him. We have pity for a man who cannot get out of his own way, who is his own worst enemy.
The acting is superb, the scenery/sets beautiful and fitting of the time and place. Often meanings are conveyed through looks, expressions, and not an excess of words. The score by Carl Davis is appropriate and adds to the feel of the series, enhancing the whole thing.
What luck that this is on DVD, complete with biographies on Sir Alan Bates and Thomas Hardy, among other things. Don't miss this gem.
The acting is superb, the scenery/sets beautiful and fitting of the time and place. Often meanings are conveyed through looks, expressions, and not an excess of words. The score by Carl Davis is appropriate and adds to the feel of the series, enhancing the whole thing.
What luck that this is on DVD, complete with biographies on Sir Alan Bates and Thomas Hardy, among other things. Don't miss this gem.
Outstanding adaptation of Hardian gloom
joanmarieherbers26 April 2006
Another BBC masterpiece finally out on DVD. Hardy's world is shown in all its darkness, yet permeated by rays of hope. This rendition of the classic novel is brilliantly cast and well shot. You have to listen pretty hard to hear through the thick accents, but that patience is rewarded because nuances of the accents round out the characters.
Alan Bates is simply stunning as the heroic anti-hero Michael Henchard. A stupid decision made when he was a drunk 21-year-old comes back to haunt him 19 years later when the wife he sold returns to his town. The unfolding drama is about fatherhood, friendship, betrayal, and most importantly, the complexity of human characters. Bates is able to make you see inside his brain as he silently weighs courses of action between what his demons tempt him to do and what his angels urge him to do. Both sides win along the way as he redeems himself, only to then act rashly out of jealousy, embarrassment, or self-disgust.
The other characters are also well done, with Janet Maw playing the daughter who cannot understand her father until it is too late and Anna Massey playing the fallen woman who wishes to have her own life. Jack Galloway does a good job as the honest Scot, but I did not see any spark between Farfrae and Lucetta. The scenery and weather are always characters in Hardy's books, and here they enter the drama intermittently.
But this film in the end is all about Alan Bates. I love much of his other work but his Michael Henchard is the performance of a lifetime.
Alan Bates is simply stunning as the heroic anti-hero Michael Henchard. A stupid decision made when he was a drunk 21-year-old comes back to haunt him 19 years later when the wife he sold returns to his town. The unfolding drama is about fatherhood, friendship, betrayal, and most importantly, the complexity of human characters. Bates is able to make you see inside his brain as he silently weighs courses of action between what his demons tempt him to do and what his angels urge him to do. Both sides win along the way as he redeems himself, only to then act rashly out of jealousy, embarrassment, or self-disgust.
The other characters are also well done, with Janet Maw playing the daughter who cannot understand her father until it is too late and Anna Massey playing the fallen woman who wishes to have her own life. Jack Galloway does a good job as the honest Scot, but I did not see any spark between Farfrae and Lucetta. The scenery and weather are always characters in Hardy's books, and here they enter the drama intermittently.
But this film in the end is all about Alan Bates. I love much of his other work but his Michael Henchard is the performance of a lifetime.
A superb series
TheLittleSongbird1 August 2012
The Mayor of Casterbridge is a wonderful story, maybe not the most accessible of his work but bleak but compelling and poignant. This 1978 series is superb. The photography is skillful, while the costumes and sets are both beautiful and bleakily atmospheric. The music conveys an appropriately evocative mood, while the story while unfolding at a deliberate slow pace is still moving and the script sophisticated, thoughtful and faithful in spirit to Hardy's work. The performances are just as impressive, whether in the facial expressions or the nuanced accents, with Alan Bates embodying Henchard's character to perfection. In support Anne Stallybrass and Anna Massey fare best in portrayals just as moving and well-realised. Janet Maw is also great. Jack Galloway is not quite as good, he is suitably dour but his character here is not as complex.
All in all, superb series and highly recommended. 10/10 Bethany Cox
All in all, superb series and highly recommended. 10/10 Bethany Cox
one of the great BBC dramas
pianissimo_55017 July 2010
Warning: Spoilers
'The Mayor of Casterbridge'starts with the gloomy and bitter Michael Henchard walking with his wife and daughter on a road in Wessex. They pass a fair and at that moment Henchard makes the biggest mistake of his life. It is a relentlessly and unremittingly bleak tale. Alan Bates as Henchard is monumentally brilliant and manages to chart this man's destiny with great subtlety -- he takes you with the character so that we are not unsympathetic to his plight when he arrives at his eventual resting place. Not a weak performance in the cast.He has strong support from Jack Galloway as Donald Farfrae,his rival, Anne Stallybrass as his wife Susan an excellent Janet Maw as his sympathetic and long suffering
daughter Elisabeth-Jane,Anna Massey as Lucetta,Ronald Lacey as the unsettling Jopp, Freddie Jones as the fortune teller,Avis Bunnage as the drink seller and Peter Bourke as the ever loyal Whittle.This was a time when television had the time and budget to tell its stories in a rich and textured way.
daughter Elisabeth-Jane,Anna Massey as Lucetta,Ronald Lacey as the unsettling Jopp, Freddie Jones as the fortune teller,Avis Bunnage as the drink seller and Peter Bourke as the ever loyal Whittle.This was a time when television had the time and budget to tell its stories in a rich and textured way.
Surprisingly good adaptation by the ever-surprising Dennis Potter
paxveritas23 November 2017
Please pardon the substandard Americanism, but "who'd a thunk" that the insanely imaginative bete noire of British television writing, Dennis Potter, could have written such a disciplined, book-faithful, beautifully-paced script as this. He pays full and respectful homage to the great Thomas Hardy's masterpiece.
No repetition of the accolades of prior reviewers is needed here. They're spot on.
What I would like to see, if I had control of casting of both the 1978 and 2003 versions, is a redistribution of the cast. For this exercise, I need a time warp.
Understanding, for example, that Polly Walker, who plays Lucetta in 2003, was only 12 years old in 1978, I would have preferred her (as she was in 2003) to Anna Massey as Lucetta in 1978. Walker has some beauty and magnetism and is believable as a man- hungry "fallen woman." Massey was undeniably an excellent actress, but as a vamp she simply can't cut it. To think Farfrae or Henchard could be attracted to her sensually is laughable. The suspension of disbelief here is too much for me to make. (By the way, her miscasting as Laura in the Pallisers is equally disturbing, as there is NO spark between her and Donal McCann in that series.)
Then I'd grab Juliet Aubrey out of the 2003 version and cast her in place of Anne Stallybrass - Aubrey portrays Susan more sensitively, more skilfully.
Janet Maw is superb as Elizabeth-Jane, so I'd leave her there, and not import Jodhi May into 1978 - May is too stilted as E-J. Both Purefoy and Galloway are very good as Farfrae, but Goodman is so very good in the minor role of Jopp that I would pull him out of 2003 to replace Lacey,
And last, I leave it to you as to Hinds or Bates as Henchard. They both turn in the most remarkable performances of their careers in Mayor of C. And that's why it's such a pleasure to watch both versions. despite the dreadful editing of Hardy in 2003.
No repetition of the accolades of prior reviewers is needed here. They're spot on.
What I would like to see, if I had control of casting of both the 1978 and 2003 versions, is a redistribution of the cast. For this exercise, I need a time warp.
Understanding, for example, that Polly Walker, who plays Lucetta in 2003, was only 12 years old in 1978, I would have preferred her (as she was in 2003) to Anna Massey as Lucetta in 1978. Walker has some beauty and magnetism and is believable as a man- hungry "fallen woman." Massey was undeniably an excellent actress, but as a vamp she simply can't cut it. To think Farfrae or Henchard could be attracted to her sensually is laughable. The suspension of disbelief here is too much for me to make. (By the way, her miscasting as Laura in the Pallisers is equally disturbing, as there is NO spark between her and Donal McCann in that series.)
Then I'd grab Juliet Aubrey out of the 2003 version and cast her in place of Anne Stallybrass - Aubrey portrays Susan more sensitively, more skilfully.
Janet Maw is superb as Elizabeth-Jane, so I'd leave her there, and not import Jodhi May into 1978 - May is too stilted as E-J. Both Purefoy and Galloway are very good as Farfrae, but Goodman is so very good in the minor role of Jopp that I would pull him out of 2003 to replace Lacey,
And last, I leave it to you as to Hinds or Bates as Henchard. They both turn in the most remarkable performances of their careers in Mayor of C. And that's why it's such a pleasure to watch both versions. despite the dreadful editing of Hardy in 2003.
If you have the time, watch this one!
crempelthiessen19 April 2006
Warning: Spoilers
I just watched the 7-episode DVD: The Mayor of Casterbridge. It was long and segmented. (If he is the Mayor why do they choose only family scenes?)
I kept changing the volume, because I found the voices hard to hear. They were either too soft and muffled or too loud and slurred, as in a drunken state.Besides, they were speaking with an English or Scottish accent!
One of the themes was about fathers: real fathers and what is a real father. The couple that comes together in the end, were cute. the Mayor, main character, was somewhat realistic, yet complex. He is his own man, yet haunted by his own decisions.
Does anyone know, is Casterbridge a real place?
I kept changing the volume, because I found the voices hard to hear. They were either too soft and muffled or too loud and slurred, as in a drunken state.Besides, they were speaking with an English or Scottish accent!
One of the themes was about fathers: real fathers and what is a real father. The couple that comes together in the end, were cute. the Mayor, main character, was somewhat realistic, yet complex. He is his own man, yet haunted by his own decisions.
Does anyone know, is Casterbridge a real place?
A Story about karma
jenniferpoole27 August 2023
This brilliant adaption of a typically grim hardy novel was filmed in Corfe Castle, Dorset, but is set in Dorchester (aka Casterbridge). Given that it is 45 years old and it stands up well. Technically. Bates is of course the star. Sadly, Farfrae and Lucetta are poorly caste (the newer version being much better) but it is good to see the story told as written (mostly) and no one afraid to take a long time about it. It shows a man recovering from an early failure of character, who then does well. But then he lets himself down again and starts to fail. He makes a recovery of sorts, only to let himself (and others) down again. In short. This is a story about karma and how we control our own fortune. For those of us who are able to concentrate for an extended period of time it is well worth agonising over his life.
The dramatic tension of a peanut dissolving in oil
irish2326 January 2007
A classic ancient BBC production: promising actors with a sparsely populated script, indecipherable accents, atrocious sound quality, and Extremely Long Takes Wherein Nothing Really Happens.
Potentially deeply emotional scenes are read through instead of explored. It's as if the text of the script is so sacred the actors daren't internalize it for fear of desecrating it.
Confusing jumps in time compound the badness. In addition, by trimming some exposition, we're not quite sure what transpires between some characters, or if we do know What, we're never sure Why.
This is an excellent soporific. It also works well if you need to exercise your thumb on the fast-forward button. It's difficult to miss an important piece of dialogue or even a scene. If "torpid" is what you're looking for, this is the mini-series for you.
Potentially deeply emotional scenes are read through instead of explored. It's as if the text of the script is so sacred the actors daren't internalize it for fear of desecrating it.
Confusing jumps in time compound the badness. In addition, by trimming some exposition, we're not quite sure what transpires between some characters, or if we do know What, we're never sure Why.
This is an excellent soporific. It also works well if you need to exercise your thumb on the fast-forward button. It's difficult to miss an important piece of dialogue or even a scene. If "torpid" is what you're looking for, this is the mini-series for you.
earnest but hard on non-Brit ears
mukava99115 May 2014
This grim BBC miniseries is hard on ears belonging to non-British viewers who aren't already familiar with the Thomas Hardy source novel, so thick are the regional accents, so muffled is the soundtrack, and so lackadaisically introduced are some of the plot developments. Whether you can understand all of his utterances or not, Alan Bates gives a robust performance in the lead, his second foray into Hardy territory, several years after his incarnation as sheep farmer Gabriel Oak in John Schlesinger's "Far from the Madding Crowd." Henchard is far less appealing than Oak and it's difficult to warm to such a man although you can respect him for rising from the mess he makes of his youth to prominence and commercial success in middle age. Bates barks most of his lines as if to emphasize his character's simplicity and lack of finesse. His outbursts of rage and drunken excess are brilliantly effective. There is nothing likable about him but we can empathize with his plight, that of an ordinary man with strengths and weaknesses who was unlucky enough to make a major mistake early in life that eventually overshadowed all that was to come.
This adaptation by Dennis Potter takes some liberties with the twisty, coincidence-laden plot, and not always to good effect, though it's hard to tell how much was written out as opposed to how much was cut after shooting. The casting of supporting roles is apt; these are not glamorous people, but ordinary rural folk of the mid-19th century, and all of the actors who play these roles fully bring their homely characters to convincing and persuasive life, aided by the liberal use of closeups and long takes. Jack Galloway is particularly impressive as goodhearted, trusting Donald Farfrae, the Scotsman who is forcefully befriended by Henchard, only to become his undoing. Strangely, the germination and blossoming of their relationship, so clearly laid out in the novel, is skipped and introduced full-blown like an afterthought, which not only removes the fatalistic element but becomes another of several inexplicable plot shifts that viewers must accept as a given. The piling up of these arbitrary developments weaken the presentation. Like Schlesinger's "Crowd" before it, the physical production convincingly replicates the era in question, down to costume and furnishings and the population of grizzled locals seen at pubs and markets and stables. Interiors look like they were shot in the actual cramped, underlit, claustrophobic dwellings the characters inhabited. Carl Davis's somber, spare score complements the tone without getting in the way.
A boom mike is clearly visible in one parlor scene and shadows of booms appear occasionally in other scenes. At times characters run over each other's lines in a way that mimics actual non-rehearsed speech but could also be gaffes that were left intact due to budget or schedule concerns. On the whole it looks like a modestly financed production whose every penny was wisely invested in the period furnishings and costumes. Good use is made of the melancholy, windswept countryside.
This adaptation by Dennis Potter takes some liberties with the twisty, coincidence-laden plot, and not always to good effect, though it's hard to tell how much was written out as opposed to how much was cut after shooting. The casting of supporting roles is apt; these are not glamorous people, but ordinary rural folk of the mid-19th century, and all of the actors who play these roles fully bring their homely characters to convincing and persuasive life, aided by the liberal use of closeups and long takes. Jack Galloway is particularly impressive as goodhearted, trusting Donald Farfrae, the Scotsman who is forcefully befriended by Henchard, only to become his undoing. Strangely, the germination and blossoming of their relationship, so clearly laid out in the novel, is skipped and introduced full-blown like an afterthought, which not only removes the fatalistic element but becomes another of several inexplicable plot shifts that viewers must accept as a given. The piling up of these arbitrary developments weaken the presentation. Like Schlesinger's "Crowd" before it, the physical production convincingly replicates the era in question, down to costume and furnishings and the population of grizzled locals seen at pubs and markets and stables. Interiors look like they were shot in the actual cramped, underlit, claustrophobic dwellings the characters inhabited. Carl Davis's somber, spare score complements the tone without getting in the way.
A boom mike is clearly visible in one parlor scene and shadows of booms appear occasionally in other scenes. At times characters run over each other's lines in a way that mimics actual non-rehearsed speech but could also be gaffes that were left intact due to budget or schedule concerns. On the whole it looks like a modestly financed production whose every penny was wisely invested in the period furnishings and costumes. Good use is made of the melancholy, windswept countryside.
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