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Jude (1996)
Director: Michael Winterbottom
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
This determinedly non-heritage adaptation of Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure is an often impressive but oddly frustrating movie. Mostly, it's faithful to the story of the lowly but academically ambitious Wessex stonemason (Eccleston) who, after a disastrous marriage to Arabella (Griffiths), daughter of a pig farmer, heads off to the university town of Christminster, where he falls for his strong-willed, comparatively worldly-wise cousin Sue (Winslet). Somehow, however, the film never delivers the punch deserved by one of the 19th century's most movingly cruel English novels. Part of the trouble is that, in trying to cram Hardy's narrative into a mere two hours, Hossein Amini's brisk screenplay rarely does more than skate over the key dramatic moments. The leads, too, lack the chemistry to render the tragic outcome of Jude and Sue's socially unacceptable amour fou as devastating as it should be; Eccleston is too relentlessly 'intense' for Jude to seem a truly attractive prospect, while Winslet's Sue is such a thoroughly modern miss that she finally fails to convince. Eduardo Serra's 'Scope camerawork is eye-catching, and the film is never stilted, but it's hard to see how its emphasis on being 'modern' make the content really relevant to today. Ambitious, sensitive, but ultimately uninvolving.Author: GA
User reviews of this film
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- Bivash Roy said...
- Posted on Dec 04 2007 05:22 best
- Report as inappropriate
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- Barry Fisher said...
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Posted on Oct 03 2007 07:31
This is an engrossing film despite its failings. Does anyone expect a full length novel to be shown in its entirety in a two hour film? – no, we don’t, and there were many aspects of the story that could have been omitted without the film as such being affected. The death of the aunt, for example; or the countless train journeys (and some of the story lines that these were linking), or the weird scene of young Jude being taken to the horror show at the fair.
In many cases the abbreviated scenes that became necessary produced dialogue of soap opera quality.
Casting was not well thought out – Kate Winslet was no more a late nineteenth century girl than I am (and I was uncomfortable with the cigarette smoking, which didn’t ring true). And is June Whitfield ever going to be recognised for anything other than what she is, that is a much loved, long serving comedienne? Plus the odd bit of “spot the celebrity” (James Nesbitt for example), was distracting.
A fine film, with a very watchable climax, but it could have been so much better. - Report as inappropriate
Cast & crew
Director: Michael Winterbottom
Producer: Andrew Eaton
Cast: Christopher Eccleston, Kate Winslet, Liam Cunningham, Rachel Griffiths, June Whitfield, James Nesbitt, Vernon Dobtcheff, Freda Dowie, Dexter Fletcher full cast
Genre(s): Period/Swashbucklers
Duration: 122 mins
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