A Movie Nearly Every Night: Far from the Madding Crowd

Far from the Madding Crowd (1967)
Dir: John Schlesinger
Starring: Julie Christie, Terence Stamp, Peter Finch, Alan Bates

"Why is love such a misery?"

Valentine's Day is a day for love and spending the right amount of money on the right thing to please the right person. It used to be so much simpler in Thomas Hardy's day, when a little card like this

could be sent by a vain ("she checks 'er mirror to sees if 'er nightcap is on straight") but beautiful woman like this

to a lonely ("'tis said he has no passionate parts") landowner like this

and what's the worst that could happen, right?

Friends, I loves the Thomas Hardy. He wrote Victorian soap operas with good stories and kooky plot devices sure to set balls rolling every which way: gamble off your family, lose a letter, not read the sign at the church --- he's great for screwing up people's lives. Everyone marries the wrong person and stuff happens and people die and the locals talk in Dorset dialect and yet somehow it works out at the end (usually by people dying).

This movie version follows the book faithfully in gorgeous-yet-filthy Victorian settings and detail: Sturdy, reliable Gabriel Oak has nice suits for church, but they're studded with sheep wool from the farm; Bathsheba is lovely Julie Christie, who is ready to put boots on under her nightdress to go cover the ricks during a storm; and Sergeant Troy ... well, he's just plain lovely even if his hair doesn't always look entirely combed or clean.

Kneel before Zod

Everyone is wonderful --- Terence Stamp a little more wonderful than the others in some ways --- and watching the actors inhabit these people and make the characters come to life is treat treat treat. Poor Gabriel's face in the church watching his true love with someone else is subtle but so sad and so real that it's a killer. No dialog just sharp focus and key lighting with cuts to him working the fields and seeing someone else reap the benefits.


He's worried, but there's also something that's left him empty: He does for her and does for her and does for her and this is the thanks he gets? Watching her in the front row of the church singing homey harvest hymns with someone else? Man. It's even more touching when he realizes up close what it's done to poor tormented Mr. Boldwood.


Where Alan Bates' Gabriel is somewhat resigned to his position Peter Finch's Boldwood is crushed and driven mad by desire for Bathsheba. Watching Peter Finch hound Julie Christie for a marital promise is so intensely uncomfortable that I shifted a bit and thought about taking a tea break or reading a comic book or anything to split the tension. He presses and presses in this hopeful but stalking-persistent way, and they're in this tiny little room in her house ... dude. But it's her own fault for sending him that Valentine in the first place. See what comes of Valentine's Day? It's bad, BAD and leads right up to misfortune, misery and death.

Oh, and Terence Stamp.

So I guess Valentine's Day isn't all bad.