Far from the Madding Crowd

Plot synopsis:
Gabriel Oak is a young shepherd. With the savings of a frugal life, and a loan, he has leased and stocked a sheep farm. He falls in love with a newcomer six years his junior, Bathsheba Everdene, a proud beauty who arrives to live with her aunt, Mrs. Hurst. Over time, Bathsheba and Gabriel grow to like each other well enough, and Bathsheba even saves his life once. However, when he makes her an unadorned offer of marriage, she refuses; she values her independence too much, and him too little. Feeling betrayed and embarrassed, Gabriel offers blunt protestations that only foster her haughtiness. After a few days, she moves to Weatherbury, a village some miles off.
When next they meet, their circumstances have changed drastically. An inexperienced new sheepdog drives Gabriel's flock over a cliff, ruining him. After selling off everything of value, he manages to settle all his debts but emerges penniless. He seeks employment at a hiring fair in the town of Casterbridge. When he finds none, he heads to another such fair in Shottsford, a town about ten miles from Weatherbury. On the way, he happens upon a dangerous fire on a farm and leads the bystanders in putting it out. When the veiled owner comes to thank him, he asks if she needs a shepherd. She uncovers her face and reveals herself to be none other than Bathsheba. She has recently inherited her uncle's estate and is now wealthy. Though somewhat uncomfortable, she employs him.
=== Bathsheba's valentine to Boldwood ===
Meanwhile, Bathsheba has a new admirer: the lonely and repressed William Boldwood. Boldwood is a prosperous farmer of about forty, whose ardour Bathsheba unwittingly awakens when – her curiosity piqued because he has never bestowed on her the customary admiring glance – she playfully sends him a valentine sealed with red wax on which she has embossed the words, "Marry me". Boldwood, not realising the valentine was a jest, becomes obsessed with Bathsheba and soon proposes marriage. Although she does not love him, she toys with the idea of accepting his offer; he is, after all, the most eligible bachelor in the district. However, she postpones giving him a definite answer. When Gabriel rebukes her for her thoughtlessness regarding Boldwood, she fires him.
When Bathsheba's sheep begin dying from bloat, she discovers to her chagrin that Gabriel is the only man who knows how to cure them. Her pride delays the inevitable, but finally she is forced to beg him for help. Afterwards, she offers him back his job and their friendship is restored.
=== Sergeant Troy returns ===
At this point, the dashing Sergeant Francis "Frank" Troy returns to his native Weatherbury and by chance encounters Bathsheba one night. Her initial dislike turns to infatuation after he excites her with a private display of swordsmanship. Gabriel observes Bathsheba's interest in the young soldier and tries to discourage it, telling her she would be better off marrying Boldwood. Boldwood becomes aggressive towards Troy, and Bathsheba goes to Bath to prevent Troy returning to Weatherbury, as she fears Troy may be harmed on meeting Boldwood. On their return, Boldwood offers his rival a large bribe to give up Bathsheba. Troy pretends to consider the offer, then scornfully announces they are already married. Boldwood withdraws, humiliated, and vows revenge.
Bathsheba soon discovers that her new husband is an improvident gambler with little interest in farming. Worse, she begins to suspect he does not love her. In fact, Troy's heart belongs to her former servant, Fanny Robin. Before meeting Bathsheba, Troy had promised to marry Fanny; on the wedding day, however, the luckless girl went to the wrong church. She explained her mistake, but Troy, humiliated at being left at the altar, angrily called off the wedding. When they parted, unbeknownst to Troy, Fanny was pregnant with his child.
=== Fanny Robin ===
Some months later, Troy and Bathsheba encounter Fanny on the road, destitute, as she painfully makes her way toward the Casterbridge workhouse. Troy sends his wife onward with the horse and gig before she can recognise the girl, then gives Fanny all the money in his pocket, telling her he will give her more in a few days. Fanny uses up the last of her strength to reach her destination. A few hours later, she dies in childbirth, along with the baby. Mother and child are then placed in a coffin and sent home to Weatherbury for interment. Gabriel, who has long known of Troy's relationship with Fanny, tries to conceal the child's existence – but Bathsheba agrees that the coffin can be left in her house overnight, from her sense of duty towards a former servant of the household. Her new servant, Liddy, repeats the rumour that Fanny had a child; when all the servants are in bed, Bathsheba unscrews the lid and sees the two bodies inside.
Troy then comes home from Casterbridge, where he had gone to keep his appointment with Fanny. Seeing the reason for her failure to meet him, he gently kisses the corpse and tells the anguished Bathsheba, "This woman is more to me, dead as she is, than ever you were, or are, or can be". The next day he spends all his money on a marble tombstone with the inscription: "Erected by Francis Troy in beloved memory of Fanny Robin ..." Then, loathing himself and unable to bear Bathsheba's company, he leaves. After a long walk he bathes in the sea, leaving his clothes on the beach. A strong current carries him away, but he is rescued by a rowing boat.
=== Climax ===
A year later, with Troy presumed drowned, Boldwood renews his suit. Burdened with guilt over the pain she has caused him, Bathsheba reluctantly consents to marry him in six years, long enough to have Troy declared dead.
Troy, however, is not dead. When he learns that Boldwood is again courting Bathsheba, he returns to Weatherbury on Christmas Eve to claim his wife. He goes to Boldwood's house, where a party is under way, and orders Bathsheba to come with him; when she shrinks back in surprise, he seizes her arm, and she screams. At this, Boldwood shoots Troy dead and tries unsuccessfully to turn the gun on himself. Although Boldwood is condemned to hang for murder, his friends petition the Home Secretary for mercy, citing insanity. This is granted, and Boldwood's sentence is changed to "confinement during Her Majesty's pleasure". Bathsheba, profoundly chastened by guilt and grief, buries her husband in the same grave as Fanny and the child, and adds a suitable inscription.
=== Ending ===
Throughout her tribulations, Bathsheba comes to rely increasingly on her oldest and, as she admits to herself, only real friend, Gabriel. When he gives notice that he is leaving her employ, she realises how important he has become to her well-being. That night, she goes alone to visit him in his cottage, to find out why he is deserting her. Pressed, he reluctantly reveals that it is because people have been injuring her good name by gossiping that he wants to marry her. She exclaims that it is "... too absurd – too soon – to think of, by far!" He bitterly agrees that it is absurd, but when she corrects him, saying that it is only "too soon", he is emboldened to ask once again for her hand in marriage. She accepts, and the two are quietly wed.

Tags: romantic, murder, melodrama

Review:
Each viewing has me finding it even more beautiful than on the previous occasion  it may seem slow to first-time viewers but they should make the effort to watch the thing a few more times !!!This film is without any doubt that which perfectly renders the atmosphere of Thomas Hardy's Wessex !
Other films of Thomas Hardy country, such as Tess and others, pale into insignificance beside this one though it must be said that Tess, although taking place in Dorset was actually filmed in Normandy ( Cherbourg Peninsula) which would explain why the atmosphere wasn't the same.Each scene of this film has remained indelible in my mind, the sheep being pushed over the cliff by the mad sheepdog, the corn market ( actually filmed in Devizes, Wiltshire ), the water flowing down Gold Hill in Shaftesbury, Dorset where poor young Fanny Robbins painfully seeking to mount during her last few hours on earth, the cock-fight, the beautiful views of the Dorset Coast with Durdle Door and the chalk cliffs, the romantic dalliance of Troy and Bathsheba doubtlessly filmed in one of those prehistoric burial mounds so common in Wiltshire.
So, Schlesinger does the next best thing in developing the characters with an excellent cast including Christie, Finch, Stamp and Bates.
What a treat to see an adaption of this marvellous but hard going book, of course it's always worth the effort to read Hardy, but it takes getting into, you have to be in the right mind frame, so dramatisations of his wonderfully rich characters are always wonderful to watch, and open up his work to a wider audience I should imagine.This film in particular was pretty true to the script, if a little condensed, in places.
I felt Alan Bates was just fantastic on screen, but probably had the right amount of charm and screen magnetism for the box office, but a little too much to be a true Farmer Oak as described by Hardy, what women in her right mind would ever turn him down,being so sweet and looking like that, I must watch more of his films.Everyone else was just brilliant as well, and it was lovely to see the beautiful Dorset I visit often so on the big screen and note it really hasn't changed that much at all since the filming in the 60's.An excellent film, don't miss it !!!.
This is a brilliant film from beginning to end and Julie Christie delivers one of the great female performances in movies.
Peter Finch, who seldom turned in a weak performance, is a standout in this film.The great works of literary giants like Thomas Hardy invariably inspire strong opinions about film adaptations.
Schlesinger remains faithful to the romantic spirit of Hardy, drenching the magnificent cinematography in the exquisite pastoral music of Richard Rodney Bennett, who clearly wrote under the influence of Vaughan Williams and Delius, while interpreting the story for the cinema very much in his own way.
The film is long; but craftmanlike, and characterised by superb performances, with  Peter Finch as the tormented Boldwood, and Alan Bates as Gabriel, who is the moral force within the story, particularly excellent.
The story really got moving at that point, with all the principals giving solid performances.Stamp, as mentioned before, stands out as Frank, the amoral ex-soldier whose love-hate relationship with Christie leads to tragedy.
Having read this book more than once (it is my favorite Thomas Hardy book, and one of my favorite books of all time), and having seen both filmed versions, I have to say that this version (with Alan Bates, Julie Christie and Peter Finch) cannot hold a candle to the BBC remake, released in 1998, with Nathaniel Parker, Paloma Baeza and Nigel Terry.This Bates/Christie version was a great disappointment to me.
Julie Christie was too old for the part of Bathsheba, did not fit Hardy's description of her at all, and has never impressed me as much of an actress -- an opinion which has only been substantiated by her high-school-calibre performance in this film -- a MAJOR casting faux pas!
The greatest surprise to me, in regard to this film, was that I also felt the same about Alan Bates' performance as Gabriel Oak -- he just did not convey the emotions and the quality of Oak's character, as described by Hardy in the book, and I found his portrayal to be PAINFULLY bland and boring.
(a STRIKING contrast to Nathaniel Parker's sensitive, powerful, heart-wrenching portrayal of Oak in the 1998 film).Part of the blame would have to be shared by the director of this version -- the actors APPEARED to be acting, and neither they, nor the director, seemed to have a firm grasp or understanding of the explicit emotions and personalities of the characters, which Hardy had gone to great effort and detail to describe in the book.
I highly recommend to anyone who has seen only this version -- or to anyone who has never seen either version -- that you rent or buy the 1998 BBC film, which is truer to Hardy's book (although some changes were made in that adaptation also, due to time constraints, it wasn't nearly as "choppy" as this one), and is a quality production in every way, and brilliantly acted, from the main players right down through the supporting cast..
JULIE Christie is merely sullen in the role, affecting a number of poses but never really doing anything more than giving us a surface portrait of the woman around whom the whole tale spins.The same flaws inhabit the dull male characters, about whom we have a hard time being even interested in, as played by TERENCE STAMP, ALAN BATES and PETER FINCH.Furthermore, the whole tale takes almost three hours to tell, during which time we get a wonderful feel of the climate and texture of life in those times but rarely get a glimpse of what makes the characters tick.
No film of this length can keep the viewer interested unless the characters come to life, and here they clearly do not.Like all of Hardy's novel, the story depends heavily on coincidence and how it plays a part in the fate of its leading players.
Bathsheba Everdine (Christie)has three suitors in the form of the dashing Troy(Stamp) the dependable Oak (Bates) and the brooding/obsessed Boldwood (Finch).
Based on the book by Thomas Hardy, this film is slow and serene with a quiet realism and sense of time and place (19th century England).
In rural Victorian England, vain and beautiful Julie Christie (as Bathsheba Everdene) attracts three handsome marriage prospects - poor sheep herder Alan Bates (as Gabriel Oak), wealthy older Peter Finch (as William Boldwood), and sexy sergeant Terence Stamp (as Francis "Frank" Troy).
But, apart from Stamp's phallic symbolizing, the story seems castrated.****** Far from the Madding Crowd (10/16/67) John Schlesinger ~ Julie Christie, Terence Stamp, Peter Finch, Alan Bates.
Based on a Thomas Hardy novel,"far from the madding crowd" is visually a splendor.Nicolas Roeg's cinematography (Roeg would direct Christie in "Don't look back" ) is dazzling and the English country landscapes a feast for the eye.So is Julie Christie.A bit slow-moving -but certainly less than "Barry Lindon" "far from the madding crowd" depicts the loves and times of a rich heiress wooed by three men: a wealthy farmer (Finch) ,a handsome military man (Stamp) and a shepherd (Bates).The character of Bathsheba is feminist before feminism:she claims her firm independence of men even if she feels her power over them.The movie inspired Ray Davis (the Kinks) a famous song called "Waterloo sunset" .Terry and Julie being Christie and Stamp.Like this?try these......"Wuthering heights" ,William Wyler ,1939 "Tess" Roman Polanski 1979 "Jude" Michael Winterbottom,1996.
It's beautifully filmed and a sublime realization of the Thomas Hardy novel.I disagree that Julie Christy doesn't do justice to the character of Bathsheba Everdene.
The complex relationships between Bathsheba Everdene and the three men who love her are as well-developed as any I've ever seen in a film, as is the growth of her character, as she learns some deep lessens about what's important in life.
As I look back on it now, Terence Stamp provided his best performance in this film which should have made him a super-star, to think that he was reduced to playing roles like General Zod is astonishing and supremely sad.
A parade of rustic characters are a perfect foil to the clearly defined main characters, with Julie Christie perfect as the independent but vulnerable Bathsheba Everdene and Terrence Stamp giving Sergeant Troy all the vanity and selfishness that the novel portrays.
The cast and the fact that I love the book(possibly my personal favourite of Thomas Hardy's work) were what drove me into seeing this Far From the Madding Crowd.
Julie Christie is an affecting and spirited Bathsheba, Terence Stamp is appropriately soldierly and crusty, Alan Bates does down-to-earth very effectively and Peter Finch devastates as the tragic Boldwood.
And it took its time to unfold with an intermission to give extended bladders a break.Set along the Dorset coast around 1870, Julie Christie plays Bathsheba Everdene, a woman who turns the heads of three men: one who loves her too much, one who doesn't love her enough and one who loves her about right.
The three are William Boldwood (Peter Finch), Francis Troy (Terrence Stamp) and Gabriel Oak (Alan Bates).They represent different classes: William Boldwood the landed gentry, Gabriel Oak the poor, but dependable farmer while Frank Troy is a soldier, the bad boy Bathsheba falls for.Along with storms, barn fires and haywaining, the passions run deep, all masked behind Victorian propriety.
When you see pictures of dour-looking old Thomas Hardy, it's hard to believe he penned this tale of unrequited love, obsession and jealously, and also created the strong-willed and free-spirited character of Bathsheba Everdene.Director John Schlesinger built on that independent spirit.
Julie Christie gave a nuanced performance; confident when warding off the advances of those she felt less passionate about, but vulnerable when the tables are turned.Peter Finch just got better with age; he quietly delivers the proud gentleman who is humiliated by his obsession for Bathsheba.
Terrence Stamp and Alan Bates also deliver powerfully realised characters.A highlight of the film is Richard Rodney Bennett's score, which gives Vaughan Williams a run for his money with its haunting flutes and lyrical sense of folksong.There are other versions.
It was his first with a rural rather than an urban setting, and it was a period piece whereas his earlier films had all had a contemporary setting.Now that adaptations of the works of Thomas Hardy and other nineteenth-century novelists have become such a central feature of the British cinema, it is hard to recall what a bold choice this was in 1967.
It tells the story of Bathsheba Everdene, a young woman who inherits her uncle's farm and decides to manage it herself, and of the three men who love her- the shepherd Gabriel Oak, the well-to-do middle-aged bachelor farmer William Boldwood and the young soldier Sergeant Francis Troy.
They come from Julie Christie as the beautiful and independent, but also headstrong and wilful, Bathsheba; from Alan Bates as the quiet, steadfast Gabriel, Peter Finch as the obsessive, emotionally repressed Boldwood and Terence Stamp as the handsome but feckless and unfaithful Troy.
Forty something landowner Peter Finch, rakish infantry sergeant Terence Stamp, and poor, but honest shepherd Alan Bates.Bathsheba chooses badly, but all becomes right in the end for her when she winds up with the right man.
This is just about my favourite movie of all time and I strongly recommend buying the new BFI DVD, which apart from digitally remastering the film itself contains some really interesting "extras", including interviews with Terence Stamp (whom director John Schlesinger really didn't want), screenwriter Frederic Raphael and director of photography Nicolas Roeg, plus footage taken during the filming and brief reports from some of the locations used.
Bathsheba Everdene (Julie Christie), a willful, flirtatious, young woman, unexpectedly inherits a large farm and is romantically pursued by three very different men.Roger Ebert wrote, "Thomas Hardy's novel told of a 19th century rural England in which class distinctions and unyielding social codes surrounded his characters.
Without a fine script, fashioning a great movie is well nigh impossible, and given the challenges of adapting this particular Hardy novel to film, the end results are still impressive.
And the names surrounding this adaptation Julie Christie, Alan Bates, Terence Stamp, John Schlesinger, had me chomping at the bit.
Wonderful performances from Alan Bates, Peter Finch, Julie Christie, Terrence Stamp and many others.
The cast is also brilliant, starting with the stunningly beautiful Julie Christie, who shows us why the three men are attracted to her and how clueless the character of Bathsheba was.
Julie Christie is beautiful, Terence Stamp is dashing, Alan Bates is reliable, and Peter Finch is overwrought.
Only Terence Stamp animates the character of Sgt Troy into something believable and real.Also, the film has none of the humour and warmth from the book.I have recently seen other literary adaptations with some stupendous acting (eg.
Peter Finch, Alan Bates and Terence Stamp are as as good as ever and, although it has taken me two viewings to realize it, Julie Christie holds her own just as well.
It is a beautifully shot film.There were a couple of scenes missing though that I thought should have been in this film; One was the scene with the mirror at the beginning of the book and the other was the scene where Bathsheba saves Oak from becoming overcome with fumes in his shepherd's hut - key early scenes for both characters I think and it's a shame they weren't there.I still think that Bathsheba should have had darker hair (and worn less make-up!), but apart from that, Julie Christie was excellent in the role and Alan Bates did seem a bit old to play Gabriel (and it was a long time ago that I last read it, but didn't he have much lighter hair in the book?).
But this one has to be among the best.Completely faithful to the heart of Thomas Hardy's novel, this treatment takes you into the world of Gabriel Oak, who loves Bathsheba, who in turn, transfixes any man she comes into contact with.
It's fascinating to watch Julie Christie twist Peter Finch and Alan Bates around her little finger, who are all excellent in their roles.But the true stars of the movie are the director and screenwriter and their attention to detail and their superb use of time and place and in doing so brings Thomas Hardy's romantic novel to life.
Perhaps this is more praise for Hardy's novel than for the movie...but there are numerous places in this depiction of love and pride, betrayal and vanity and arrogance that ring true--much more so than in any movie in recent memory.Alan Bates is superb in anything he does, and Peter Finch is excellent as a man driven to distraction by the Christie character.
Yeah a really great film.I never read Thomas Hardy, but I watched this on laser disc due to the widescreen version, Julie Christie, and director John Schlesinger.
John Schlesinger's film of Thomas Hardy's novel was released in 1967 and I saw it twice in the early 1970s.
I was prompted to view it again by the 2010 movie "Tamara Drewe" whose storyline is inspired by "Far From The Madding Crowd".It was a pleasure to revisit Schlesinger's work which has a star-stunned cast with the beautiful Julie Christie as Bathsheba Everdine and Peter Finch, Terence Stamp and Alan Bates as the three men seeking her affections.
Julie Christie, Terence Stamp, Alan Bates, and Peter Finch all give excellent performances, especially Stamp as a career soldier who exhibited a range of emotions in his role as the impulsive rogue named Troy.
Christie's performance shows Bathsheba's development, from silly and impetuous young girl to a far more mature and wiser woman.Alan Bates is the other true star here, as Gabriel Oak. Some viewers regard his performance as stuffy or boring.
Here, we have four of England's top film stars from the 60s (Julie Christie, Alan Bates, Terence Stamp, and Peter Finch) brought together, by legendary film director, John Schlesinger in a beautifully realized film.
Bathsheba Everdene (Julie Christie) is a simple country girl when Gabriel Oak (Alan Bates), a shepherd comes to ask for her hand in marriage, hoping to be the first to so ask.
John Schlesinger's film "Far From the Madding Crowd" is another good and almost epic story about a woman divided for the love of three men.
Here Julie Christie plays a woman owner of a farm who gets involved (in one way or another) with a rich farmer (Peter Finch), a rustic and quite gentle countrymen (Alan Bates) and a playful heroic sergeant (Terence Stamp).
As for the performances, Julie Christie is good and remarkably beautiful as the heroine, but it's the men in her life - solid Oak, sexy but impecunious Troy, and obsessive Boldwood - and the actors who play them that make the film really memorable..
A double-bill of two film adaptations of Thomas Hardy's novel, about a Victorian liberated and strong-willed girl named Bathsheba Everdene (Mulligan/Christie), who is an orphan but fortuitously inherits a farm from her late uncle, but in due course, her romantic entanglements with three very different men, the honest and devoted shepherd Gabriel Oak (Schoenaerts/Bates), the wealthy, middle age bachelor William Boldwood (Sheen/Finch) and a hot-headed sergeant Frank Troy (Sturridge/Stamp), will teach her a hard lesson with a shocking third act.
Lovely film of Thomas Hardy's novel.
Bathsheba Everdene (Julie Christie) is loved by three men (Terence Stamp, Peter Finch, Alan Bates), but it ends up causing tragedy in everyone's lives."Far from the Madding Crowd" is not just any costume drama.
It was adapted from a Thomas Hardy novel of the same name.Set in Victorian England, Schlesinger's film stars Julie Christie as the fiercely independent Bathsheba Everdine, a young woman who attempts to manage the farm she inherits from her uncle.