Last week I watched a five-hour mini-series called Parade's End starring the wonderful, baritone-voiced Benedict Cumberbatch of Star Trek and Sherlock fame. He actually starred in this film prior to becoming the huge celebrity he is now.
The film is based on a tetralogy of books of the same name written by Ford Madox Ford....the basic tale is of a man, Christopher Tietjans, forced to marry a woman he doesn't love as she's carrying a child who may or may not be his as he considers himself one of the last true gentleman. On top of that, he falls for a young suffragette (the books/movie take place just prior to and during the first World War) but despite popular belief, their relationship remains physically and, for the most part, emotionally chaste.
The movie is slow moving and does not really address the Great War except as the backdrop for most of the story. I think you really have to be a fan of Mr. Cumberbatch's or enjoy British character dramas to want to sit through this. I mostly enjoyed it, then proceeded to download the book to see how it compared. As of this post, I'm nowhere near finished, but so far most of the book's events as well as key dialogue made it into the film. The hero is not as sympathetic in the book as he is in the film, although there were parts in the film where he wasn't very sympathetic either.
So has anyone happened to have seen this mini-series? What did you think?
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