# Jude (1996 film)
**Jude** is a 1996 British drama film directed by [Michael Winterbottom](https://www.edgepedia.org/michael-winterbottom), adapted by screenwriter Hossein Amini from [Thomas Hardy](https://www.edgepedia.org/thomas-hardy)'s final novel *Jude the Obscure*. It stars [Christopher Eccleston](https://www.edgepedia.org/christopher-eccleston) as Jude Fawley, a stonemason who dreams of a university education, and Kate Winslet as his cousin Sue Bridehead, whose refusal to conform to Victorian marriage conventions makes the couple outcasts.[1](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/301e1555-6a4c-5d25-b2db-b75fb54ba2ba/jude) • [2](https://storre.stir.ac.uk/bitstream/1893/2605/1/Strong%20%281999%29%20-%20Six%20English%20Novels%20Adapted%20for%20the%20Cinema.pdf)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Source | Adaptation of Thomas Hardy's *Jude the Obscure*, his last novel, first published in the 1890s[2](https://storre.stir.ac.uk/bitstream/1893/2605/1/Strong%20%281999%29%20-%20Six%20English%20Novels%20Adapted%20for%20the%20Cinema.pdf) |
| Director / writer | Michael Winterbottom; screenplay by Hossein Amini[1](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/301e1555-6a4c-5d25-b2db-b75fb54ba2ba/jude) |
| Lead cast | Christopher Eccleston (Jude Fawley), Kate Winslet (Sue Bridehead), Liam Cunningham (Phillotson), Rachel Griffiths (Arabella), June Whitfield (Aunt Drusilla)[2](https://storre.stir.ac.uk/bitstream/1893/2605/1/Strong%20%281999%29%20-%20Six%20English%20Novels%20Adapted%20for%20the%20Cinema.pdf) |
| Key crew | Producer Andrew Eaton; cinematography Eduardo Serra; editing Trevor Waite; music Adrian Johnston; production design Joseph Bennett[2](https://storre.stir.ac.uk/bitstream/1893/2605/1/Strong%20%281999%29%20-%20Six%20English%20Novels%20Adapted%20for%20the%20Cinema.pdf) |
| Release | October 18, 1996 (United States); United Kingdom production[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116722/) |
| Runtime and rating | 123 minutes; rated R for strong sexuality and intense depictions of death and birth[4](https://www.universalpicturesathome.com/movies/jude) |
| Box office | Estimated budget of $7,000,000; gross in the US and Canada of $409,144[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116722/) |
| Critical standing | 80% on the Rotten Tomatoes Tomatometer from 40 reviews; 73% audience score[5](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/jude) |
## Spoilers
### Plot and source
The film follows Jude Fawley, a rural stonemason in late 19th-century England who aspires to study at Christminster, the university city of Hardy's fictional Wessex, but is blocked by his working-class background. After a brief, unhappy marriage to Arabella, the daughter of a local pig farmer, he moves to Christminster and falls in love with his cousin Sue Bridehead, a free-spirited young woman who wants to be a teacher. When the two live together outside marriage, they are rejected by their community: Jude loses work, they are thrown out of lodgings, and they sink into poverty while raising children.[6](https://kinolorber.com/film/jude) • [7](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/jude-1996)
Roger Ebert, the longtime film critic of the [Chicago Sun-Times](https://www.edgepedia.org/chicago-sun-times), noted that the film softens the novel's ending, finding a bittersweet close by overlooking the final pages of Hardy's book, which are grimmer than what appears on screen.[7](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/jude-1996) [The Irish Times](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-irish-times) review described the treatment as essentially faithful to what it called Hardy's last and bleakest novel.[8](https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/going-from-the-obscure-to-the-ridiculous-1.92360)
## Style and production
**A deliberate anti-heritage film.** Critics placed *Jude* against the British heritage cinema of the mid-1990s, the cycle of literary adaptations built on sunny colors, elegant costumes, and handsome sets. The Irish Times called the film the antithesis of that cycle, shot in a sombre, muted color scheme on grim locations, with a brief black-and-white prologue establishing the harshness of Jude's childhood before the story moves to the village of Marygreen in the 1880s.[8](https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/going-from-the-obscure-to-the-ridiculous-1.92360) Ebert praised the period landscape and townscape created by Winterbottom and cinematographer Eduardo Serra, whose opening black-and-white compositions place small figures against vast, dark fields.[7](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/jude-1996) The Los Angeles Times described Serra's look as dark and steel-engraving-like, giving the film a somber magnificence.[9](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-10-18-ca-54949-story.html)
The film does not cut away from physical harshness. The Washington Post noted unflinching scenes of hog slaughter, a bloody birthing session, and sexual activity, in a film that reprised Hardy's outrage over religious, academic, and moral hypocrisy.[10](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1996/11/01/jude-may-bring-you-down/c73de1d8-52f7-492f-ae59-ebd8397ec392/)
Filming locations included [Durham University](https://www.edgepedia.org/durham-university) and [Durham Cathedral](https://www.edgepedia.org/durham-cathedral), standing in for Christminster.[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116722/) A period train journey was filmed on the Keighley & Worth Valley Railway in [Yorkshire](https://www.edgepedia.org/yorkshire), hauled by the ex-LMS Class 3F 'Jinty' 0-6-0T No. 47279, and a sequence was shot outside the former Richmond railway station, which had closed to traffic in 1969 and was in use as a garden center at the time of filming.[11](https://railwaymoviedatabase.com/jude/)
## Reception
The film earned an 80% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes from 40 reviews, with a critics consensus crediting the "beautifully matched" Eccleston and Winslet.[5](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/jude) Ebert grouped the two leads with [Rachel Griffiths](https://www.edgepedia.org/rachel-griffiths) as actors who "stake a difficult story and make it into a haunting film."[12](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116722/criticreviews/) The Independent's Adam Mars-Jones called the adaptation "a little triumph," arguing that tragedies are the least tractable literary classics to adapt because tinkering with their terms breaks the original.[13](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/film-hardier-than-the-rest-jude-michael-winterbottom-15-5598073.html)
Not all reviews were positive. Time Out found the film often impressive but frustrating, arguing that Amini's brisk screenplay skated over key dramatic moments in cramming Hardy's narrative into two hours and that the leads lacked chemistry.[14](https://www.timeout.com/movies/jude) [The Christian Science Monitor](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-christian-science-monitor) held that the novel's irony and sardonic wit were lost in translation.[12](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116722/criticreviews/) Commercially, the film grossed $409,144 in the United States and Canada against an estimated $7,000,000 budget.[3](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116722/)
## Context in Hardy adaptation
*Jude the Obscure* had a notorious publication history: the hostile critical reception it received is widely believed to have contributed to Hardy's abandonment of novel-writing in favor of poetry and the verse drama *The Dynasts* for the last thirty years of his life.[2](https://storre.stir.ac.uk/bitstream/1893/2605/1/Strong%20%281999%29%20-%20Six%20English%20Novels%20Adapted%20for%20the%20Cinema.pdf) A 2000 University of Malta dissertation comparing Winterbottom's film with the BBC's 1978 television series of *The Mayor of Casterbridge* concluded that *Jude* was the stronger of the two adaptations.[15](https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/87426) The Los Angeles Times observed that the film's bleak vision had more in common with Claude Berri's *Germinal* than with the contemporary cycle of [Jane Austen](https://www.edgepedia.org/jane-austen) films, and that Hardy's pessimism struck a note of recognition in the downsizing 1990s.[9](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-10-18-ca-54949-story.html)
## References
1. [Jude (1996), BFI](https://www.bfi.org.uk/film/301e1555-6a4c-5d25-b2db-b75fb54ba2ba/jude)
2. [P. Strong (1999), The Hardy Adaptations: Production Contexts, University of Stirling](https://storre.stir.ac.uk/bitstream/1893/2605/1/Strong%20%281999%29%20-%20Six%20English%20Novels%20Adapted%20for%20the%20Cinema.pdf)
3. [Jude (1996), IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116722/)
4. [Jude, Universal Pictures At Home](https://www.universalpicturesathome.com/movies/jude)
5. [Jude, Rotten Tomatoes](https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/jude)
6. [Jude, Kino Lorber Theatrical](https://kinolorber.com/film/jude)
7. [Roger Ebert (1996), Jude, RogerEbert.com](https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/jude-1996)
8. [Michael Dwyer and Helen Meany (1996), Going from the obscure to the ridiculous, The Irish Times](https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/going-from-the-obscure-to-the-ridiculous-1.92360)
9. [Kevin Thomas (1996), 'Jude' Brings Hardy's Bleak Vision to Screen, Los Angeles Times](https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1996-10-18-ca-54949-story.html)
10. [Desson Howe (1996), 'Jude' May Bring You Down, The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1996/11/01/jude-may-bring-you-down/c73de1d8-52f7-492f-ae59-ebd8397ec392/)
11. [Jude, British Railway Movie Database](https://railwaymoviedatabase.com/jude/)
12. [Jude (1996), Metacritic reviews via IMDb](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116722/criticreviews/)
13. [Adam Mars-Jones (1996), Film: Hardier than the rest, The Independent](https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/film-hardier-than-the-rest-jude-michael-winterbottom-15-5598073.html)
14. [Jude, Time Out](https://www.timeout.com/movies/jude)
15. [Karsten Xuereb (2000), Film adaptations of Thomas Hardy's Jude the Obscure and The Mayor of Casterbridge, University of Malta](https://www.um.edu.mt/library/oar/handle/123456789/87426)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Films by genre, form, and subject › Adaptations of literature, stage, and other media › Films based on novels, novellas, and short fiction › Films based on 19th-century classics*
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