RHG and I went (separately, alas) to see Far From the Madding Crowd.  I (CarrieS) have read the book, and RHG had not.  Far From the Madding Crowd is a drama set in the Victorian period about Bathsheba Everdeen, a prosperous farmer with three very different suitors.  Here are our impressions:

RHG:  WHY ARE DUDES.  WHY ARE DUDES THE FUCKING WORST.

CarrieS: THE CLOTHES I WANT THEM.

Also, I vote we have a total moratorium on people kissing while sun sets or rises between their heads.

So, let’s get this party started by talking about dudes and why they are the fucking worst.

May I present Troy, AKA Sergeant Douchebag:

 

RHG:  Oh my god, Troy.  You’re so gross and so invasive and terrible and Jesus Fucking Christ two minutes into their meeting I was like “You have to kill him.  Right now.”

 

CarrieS: I know, right?  I think he’s really miscast, because for us to believe that Bathsheba would fall for him he should at least have charm.  Think of the guys that have played Wickham in P&P adaptations – yes, we the audience see right through them, but they are cute and charming.  Troy couldn’t even master “charming rogue”.  He was unrelentingly gross.

 

RHG: You know, given that his first actions upon meeting her in the wood were to essentially go “look, I could totally kill you, but you’re perfectly safe but I could totes kill you” is… I don’t think he’s a charming rogue at all.  He’s invasive in space, in ”I know what you want, what you really want want and I’m gonna threaten you with a sword, LIE ABOUT IT, and then grope you against your consent” and he’s a total dick, there is nothing charming about this guy in words or actions, so to expect an actor, any actor, to pull it off… no.  Just no.

As Maya Angelou said, “When someone shows you who they are, BELIEVE THEM the first time.”

Honestly, Bethsheba.

 

CarrieS: Just to be clear to our readers, I’ve read the book and RHG has not, so movie comments are limited to the movie unless otherwise stated.  Troy is, believe it or not, SO MUCH WORSE in the book.  SO MUCH WORSE.

So why does Bathsheba fall for him?  In the book, it’s a combination of lust and his manipulations of her.  In the movie, I just can’t picture lusting after that guy.  Why do you think she loses her marbles over him?  Is it because he has the possibility to “tame her” and this relationship is sort of a subversion of Fifty Shades of Gray (i.e. she thinks she wants to be tamed but she wants the fantasy of not having to be in control but not the reality)?

 

RHG: Good lord IDK. Like, he’s pretty, I guess (but with sketchy taste in facial hair) but she wouldn’t be the first girl to get all tingly in her lady parts over a scarlet coat.

I don’t really understand what it is about this girl that gets dudes to propose to her after a sentence and a half of conversation.

 

CarrieS:  OK, so we can sum up our feelings about Troy by saying DIE DOUCHEBAG DIE.  What did you think about Boldwood?  Again, the movie softens him – the actor brought a lot of humanity to the part while still being faintly creepy – until his full creepiness is revealed.  Jesus Lord, that is a ton of handwringing about one Valentine.  She said she’s sorry, dude, can we move on?  Apparently, no.  What did you think of him?

Oh, and BTW, I think some of the instant proposal thing has to do with thinking of marriage in a business way, but also I would TOTALLY propose to Carey Mulligan’s version of Bathsheba minutes after meeting her.

 

 

RHG: Michael Sheen does not play dudes that are good at letting go.  Yeah, he was faintly creepy and not great at understanding a soft no.  I groaned when she was like “…yeah, sure I’ll, um, think about it” as a way to extract herself from an awkward conversation.

 

 

CarrieS:  Bathsheba has a hard time just saying, “NO HELL NO” – unless she’s firing baliffs, and even then you could tell it was totally freaking her out but she had resolve and did it anyway.  She has that same problem a lot of us do – she wants to be nice, she wants to make people happy, so just saying “NO HELL NO” to a puppy-eyed Michael Sheen is beyond her.

 

RHG: I do like how Gabriel (who yes, is adorable) was patient, but not necessarily waiting for her to get her head out of her ass.  He did tell her at the beginning that look, I’m gonna leave you and this farm at some point.  But he wasn’t being the nice guy hoping that just because he covered her grain with tarps (FUCK YOU TROY IT’LL RAIN WHETHER IT’S YOUR RECEPTION OR NOT ASSHOLE) (sorry) or saved her sheep meant that he figured she owed him, you know?  Yes, he loved her, but it wasn’t just her ass he was saving, it’s was every one who relied on that farm.

She really didn’t have much in the way of “please” and “thank you” and “I’m sorry” in her vocabulary, did she?

 

CarrieS:  I have SO MUCH to say about Gabriel.  First off – yes, he’s not the kind of “nice guy” who thinks that if he inserts enough niceness coins into the vending machine then sex will fall out (Boldwood is a great illustration of that).  He’s nice because he truly likes and respects Bathsheba and his fellow workers and he genuinely cares about their well-being.  He’s also not a doormat.  He’s the only character who respects Bathsheba’s boundaries.  When she say she won’t marry him, he doesn’t press for days or weeks or years.  He accepts it.  But he does demand that she treat him with respect and civility, as shown when he quits and won’t come back unless she asks him nicely.

 

 

I love it that in this movie love is expressed through caring action, not lust, charm, fancy words, or riches (or even “interesting pigs,” a line that made me ridiculously fond of Boldwood despite my determination to hate him).  Love is hard.  It’s not glamourous.  The fact that the most romantic thing Gabriel does is de-bloat sheep made me ridiculously happy.  We don’t see enough of that kind of expression of love in the romance genre, and I think it’s very true in real life.  My life is much cushier than Bathsheba’s, and I do love it when my husband does something traditionally romantic.  But what ties us together in marriage tends to be much more messy – shitty diapers, cleaning up barf after the kid had the flu – a lot of fluids, now that you think of it.  Shared, un-glamourous, messy labour.  It doesn’t get enough love in romance and  it’s so well-handled here.

 

RHG: No sheep farts?

 

Carrie: Alas, we have no sheep.  We’ve had farting and incontinent geriatric dogs and cats who not only farted but also shit all over the floor, so I feel we have animal farts covered, thanks.

 

 

RHG:  Ultimately, I did like it- the aesthetic was perfectly “not the London upper class” set (though I did want more interiors of the house and how it was laid out), and the golden light and some of the shots were beautiful.  The random shot of the snail on the flower?  Totally random, gorgeous.  I really wanted Bethsheba to kill Troy (after all, he had a razor sharp sword RIGHT THERE) but I’m super bloodthirsty and she is not.

I have not read any Hardy, though not overly punishing his heroine for sexual desire was unexpected.  But really.  Why are dudes.  They fuck up everything.

 

CarrieS:  I loved Carey Mulligan’s version of Bathsheba but I also wanted to shake her a lot – honestly, Bathsheba, you have a man who will debloat a sheep for you RIGHT THERE.

What did you think about Bathsheba, RHG?  Feminist icon?  Blithering idiot?  Some of both?

 

RHG:  Some of both.  Her determination to run her farm, and insistence of selling her grain herself (and not taking a shit price for it) and getting her hands dirty and getting shit done?  That was awesome.  Knowing that marriage would make all of that difficult?  Also awesome.  Falling in with a dude who had no redeeming qualities while not getting any sense of him or his life?  Bleech.  That was dumb.  (I kinda wanted her and Fanny to get together and take Troy down.)

CarrieS:  Did you have a hard time following the story?  I wasn’t surprised that they cut a lot of the book, and sometimes I thought it worked – but other times I blinked and all kinds of stuff had apparently occurred and was dispensed with in a single line.  It felt choppy, especially the later part of the middle.  So I wondered if it felt rushed or choppy to you.

 

RHG:  No.  I mean, yeah, seasons tended to happen pretty quickly, and that Old George is one long-lived old doggie, but in general I kinda wanted things to move quicker- I was a bit bored by the end.  There were some pacing issues.

 

CarrieS:  Grade?  I loved it, I’d give it an A-, although that’s partly because I adored the two leads so much that I overlooked some of the weaknesses.  Oh, fun fact – I saw an early screening in a packed theater, and usually when I go see period dramas it’s me and three 80 year old ladies, all of whom are very quiet.  It as fun to see this with an audience that was every bit as vocally appreciative of the movie as the crowd that saw Age of Ultron the next day.  It definitely affected my experience of the movie to see it with that kind of energy in the audience.

 

RHG:  I was in a theater with five other people.  I don’t understand why going to movies alone gets such a bad rap- I see like 95% of movies alone.  If I waited until someone had time to see a movie with me, I’d never go, and that is unacceptable.  (Also I got a lot of great previews so this is gonna be a fun summer).

Oh, right, you wanted a grade.  Um.  A-.  Strong female lead, delightful boy in contrast to gross dudes, beautiful cinematography, and hey, very rarely did we get two dudes talking about anything other than a woman.  HOW DOES IT FEEL BOYS.  HOW DOES IT FEEL.

 

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Far From the Maddening Crowd is in theatres now, and you can find tickets (US) at Fandango and Moviefone.