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Jude [1996] | ![Jude [1996]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51D4H2MWMEL._SL75_.jpg)
 enlarge | Director: Michael Winterbottom
Actors: Christopher Eccleston, Kate Winslet, Liam Cunningham, Rachel Griffiths, June Whitfield
Studio: 4 Front Video
Category: Video
List Price: £5.99
Buy Used: £0.97
You Save: £5.02 (84%)
New (6) Used (13) Collectible (1) from £0.97
Avg. Customer Rating:  12 reviews
Sales Rank: 9675
Format: Closed-captioned, Dolby, Pal, Surround Sound
Language: English (Original Language)
Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over
Media: VHS Tape
Number Of Items: 1
Running Time: 117
Discs: 1
UPC: 044004079204
EAN: 0044004379236
ASIN: B00004R6UV
Theatrical Release Date: October 18, 1996
Release Date: February 8, 1999
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: starring christopher ecclestone,kate winslet,rachel griffiths runing time 117 mins,wil be dispatched within 24 hours whenever possible from uk seller
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Amazon.co.uk Review
This curiously dry adaptation of Thomas Hardy's last novel, Jude is a good example of Michael Winterbottom's inability to make a particularly good film until Welcome to Sarajevo. Christopher Eccleston plays Jude Fawley, a self-educated stonemason who holds the dream of attending university but identifies with the working class. Kate Winslet is enlisted to play his cousin Sue Bridehead, a young woman with suffragette leanings and a position as a teacher's assistant. When the two enter into an illicit union, they are condemned to the margins of society, ultimately resulting in a horrifying tragedy. Winterbottom takes an oddly lean approach to Hardy's deterministic story, which leaves a viewer feeling short on emotion just when one needs it for the from-bad-to-worse third act. Welcome to Sarajevo proved that Winterbottom needs a whole other level of personal involvement to make a film that inspires him. Jude isn't one of those lucky films. --Tom Keogh, Amazon.com
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| Customer Reviews: Read 7 more reviews...
 Gloriously morbid and bleak December 26, 2007
This film really is a feast for manic depressives! On the one hand, you have the spirited banter between the two leads and the effusive giggliness of Arabella's character and on the other hand, starkly grim scenes of death and birth. For the squeamish, these could be stomach-churning: a pig is gruesomely killed and unceremoniously gutted; bodies are found ashen with death; and, most extraordinarily of all, when Sue (Kate Winslet) is shown giving birth, the bloody head of her baby is visible between her spread-eagled legs. It is fitting that Michael Winterbottom's adaptation of Thomas Hardy's novel should shock and horror to this degree: when Jude the Obscure was first published in 1895, it prompted widespread outcry from Victorian readers who denounced it as "coarse beyond belief" and mockingly referred to it as "Jude the Obscene". Aghast at the novel's apparent "insolence and indecency", the Bishop of Wakefield rather hysterically threw it into the fire after reading it. It was to become Hardy's last novel: he subsequently abandoned narrative-writing for poetry.
For its outspoken critique of class inequalities (in particular with regard to university admissions), the institution of marriage, Christianity, and the narrowness of women's social role, Jude the Obscure is today regarded as radical and a classic. Played with panache by a 20-year old Winslet, Sue Brideshead is a paradigmatic New Woman of the 1880s and 1890s - her very surname reflects the conflict between her headstrong nature and the social expectation that she should marry. Christopher Eccleston makes for a sterling Jude: a Dorset countryman and stonemason, angrily frustrated about his rejection from Christminster, who is tolerant of his authoritarian Aunt (June Wakefield), steadfastly honourable in marrying the supposedly pregnant Arabella (Rachel Griffiths), a pigfarmer's daughter, and warmly supportive towards his true love and nemesis, Sue (especially in the scene when they first make love). Ross Colvin Turnball also deserves a mention as the touching and melancholy son as do Eduardo Serra's beautiful cinematography and Adrian Johnston's musical score.
This film is not, however, flawless. There are quite a few implausibilities: Arabella's exit from Jude's life is inexplicably abrupt; when the young Jude is discovered feeding black crows which he is meant to scare away, the farmer pounces on him in a huge field that was empty a few seconds before; and Arabella, too, is a considerable way off, washing pig innards in a stream, when she is supposed to have been able to correctly aim a pig's heart at Jude, who is seen reading Latin in woodland. Hossein Amini's script is sometimes too modern in its vocabulary as well ("Well, you're confrontational!" says Sue at one point and at another "I'm intellectualising, aren't I?").
Jude is nevertheless a brilliantly unsanitized, emotionally intense film that is sombre and tragic - but not without light.
For fans of: Breaking the Waves, The Cement Garden, The Piano, Bleak House, Dancer in the Dark
 Film 5 stars or more, UK DVD just 2!! Get the German DVD on amazon.de August 30, 2007
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
A short synopsis will follow below. I will start with the most important information first: This film is cut! It is in a full screen 4:3 format whereas the original theater version is 2.35:1
You can however buy the original uncut version on amazon.de : "Herzen in Aufruhr" a Universal DVD (but what an awful title). It is in English (with only German subtitles - but easily removable) and dubbed into German. The picture is clear and crisp. Worth the additional shipping costs.
On the movie. A wonderful sad love story based on Thomas Hardy's classic novel. Beautiful! Terrific camera work, great acting.
Those who think the movie is not the book, well, sure it isn't. A film needs other storytelling and I think the critics should leave a director and his crew the freedom of their own interpretation.
Jude (Christopher Eccleston - terrific) is a stonemason who is eager to learn, to read. He is briefly married to a local girl but soon discovers he wants more of life than what the situation can provide. He moves to Christminster to be closer his beloved scholars. There he meets his cousin Sue (Kate Winslet - marvellous) and falls deeply in love with the lovely but very different and unconventional young woman. Society rejects their love and pushes them into tragedy.
Heartfelt performances January 23, 2006
12 out of 14 found this review helpful
I've read that this was meant to be a breakthrough film for Christopher Eccleston and audiences stayed away. They missed a classic. I did see this on its release and was blown away by it and always am when I watch it again. Not every film has to have a happy ending and Jude won't give you that but then that's not the point. The imagery is stunning and Christopher Eccleston delivers a compelling and emotive performance. He is simply awesome. One of the best films I have ever seen.
Fantastic February 21, 2005
22 out of 24 found this review helpful
Having read the synopsis on the back of the video case, I wasn't too enthusiastic about watching this film. However, it was highly recommended to me, and not without good reason. Since this site already provides a description of the plot, I won't go into detail, save to say that it is well written and carefully considered. On that note, although the film borrows only the core story from the novel on which it is based, this does not in the least detract from the finished product. Fans of the novel may initially be disapointed, but if you can disconnect the two (as they are really separate creations) then this is a highly enjoyable piece of cinema. The acting here is of a very high standard, and the two leads are so convincing in their portrayal of their respective characters that you can not help but be drawn into the complex relationship between the two. Their relationship is really the focal point of the film, with its constant twists and turns. It faces oposition almost from the start, and it is heartbreaking to watch as it blossoms into something wonderful, only to come crashing down again. Despite dealing with dreams and ambitions, and portraying society at that time, this film is, at heart, a love story. As such, its market will be sadly divided and, at the risk of sounding stereotypical, I can't help but feel that many males will miss out on a fantastic portrayal of forbidden love. I shall certainly treasure this film for a long time to come.
One of my favourite films of all time!! November 17, 2002
16 out of 33 found this review helpful
I really really love this film. Being a Kate Winslet fan i bought this purely because i wanted to see her performance in it and beyond her incredible acting ability, i discovered it balances out as also really good film supported by great actors. I had never heard of the novel the film was loosely based on but being a fan of films set in the past, it gave me alot of waht i want in a film. It made me laugh, it horrified me with its tragedy but also made me feel qarm as the relationship betwrrn Jude and Sue develops. This film has everything, laughs, tragedy romance, all rolled into one. If you are a Christopher Eccleston or a Kate Winslet fan or simply like a periodic romance than you will like this film!
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