Review of Far from the Madding Crowd (2015) by Manny C — 18 May 2015

Kudos to Danish director Thomas Vinterberg for blowing the dust off Thomas Hardy's 1874 novel about a willful heroine who would much rather run a farm she inherited than marry a man and become someone's property. Director John Schlesinger took on Hardy's tome in 1976, with more long-winded results despite the luminous Julie Christie in the starring role.

Working from a tight script from David Nicholls, Vinterberg pulls no punches. And he has the good fortune to have the magnificent Carey Mulligan to play Bathsheba Everdeen, a proto-feminist that ranks with the best of them. Sheepherder Gabriel Oak (Mattias Schoenaerts) and gentlemanly farmer William Boldwood (Michael Sheen) propose to her practically on sight, but she turns down both. 'I'd like to be a bride at a wedding', she says 'but without a husband.' But then Bathsheba falls hard for stud Sgt. Troy (Tom Sturridge), a handsome soldier with a saber he has no shame thrusting. It's all steamy stuff for a period fil set in the English countryside. Vinterberg rushes the final act some, but he still gets terrific performances from Schoenaerts, Sheen and Sturridge, and brings out a carnal side in Mulligan, who can do wonders with close-ups. Mulligan is the sparking livewire in a period film that knows how to speak stirringly to the here and now.