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List Price: $39.95Amazon.com's Price: $23.99 You Save: $15.96 (40%)Prices subject to change.
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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Binding: DVD
EAN: 9780767027717
Format: Box set, Color, DVD-Video, Full Screen, NTSC
ISBN: 076702771X
Label: A&E Home Video
Manufacturer: A&E Home Video
Number Of Items: 2
Picture Format: Pan & Scan
Publisher: A&E Home Video
Region Code: 1
Release Date: August 29, 2000
Running Time: 200 minutes
Sales Rank: 14182
Studio: A&E Home Video
Theatrical Release Date: 2000
Editorial Review:
Description:
Academy Award winner Jeremy Irons stars in this sweeping adaption of Dava Sobel's best-selling book of high seas adventure and political intrigue. Determined to stop shipping losses on the oceans of the 18th century, Britain's Parliament offers a fabulous cash award to anyone who can devise a way to determine longitute at sea. Convinced he can solve the problem that has defeated England's best minds, rural clock maker John Harrison (Michael Gambon) begins an obsessive, 40-year struggle to claim the Longitude prize with his ingenious marine clock. 200 years later, naval officer Rupert Gould (Jeremy Irons) stumbles across Harrison's forgotten chronometers and devotes himself to restoring these long-neglected mechanical masterpieces.
Amazon.com essential video:
Gracefully adapted from Dava Sobel's extraordinary bestseller, the four-part TV production of Longitude combines drama, history, and science into a stimulating, painstakingly authentic account of personal triumph and joyous discovery. Equally impressive is the way writer-director Charles Sturridge has crafted parallel stories that complement each other with enriching perspective. The first story involves the successful 40-year effort of 18th-century clockmaker John Harrison (Michael Gambon) to solve the elusive problem of measuring longitude at sea. In 1714 the British Parliament had offered a generous reward to anyone who solved the problem, and Harrison devoted his life to that solution. The second story, some 200 years later, involves the effort of shell-shocked British Navy veteran Rupert Gould (Jeremy Irons) to restore the glorious clocks that Harrison had built. Like Harrison, Gould is the most admirable type of obsessive, but, also like Harrison, he risks his marriage to accomplish his difficult task.
Thousands of sailors perished at sea before Harrison's triumph changed history, but Longitude demonstrates that Harrison's glory was slow to arrive--and his prize money even slower. A fascinating study of 18th-century British politics and clashing egos in the arena of science, the film is both epic and intimate in consequence, and Sturridge's magnificent script inspires Gambon and Irons to do some of the best work of their outstanding careers. The ever-reliable Ian Hart appears in Part 3 as Harrison's now-adult son and apprentice, and Longitude approaches its dramatic climax with the exhilarating tension of a first-rate thriller. Rallying after sickness to prove the integrity of their marvelous seafaring chronometers, the Harrisons still had to fight for official recognition, and Gould's restoration of the Harrison clockworks provides a fitting coda to this exceptional story about the thrill of discovery and the tenacity of remarkable men. --Jeff Shannon
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating:  - Well Worth Your Time
This is a visually stunning 2-disc dramatization of Dava Sobel's book about 18th century struggles to produce an accurate, seaworthy clock that would enable sailors to know their location by knowing precisely what time it was.
The acting is superb; the settings and production values are magnificent. This film does a worthy job of telling the story of John Harrison's 50-year battle to be granted the prize promised by the English Crown to the man who could produce a reliable timepiece. ... Read More
Rating: - Excellent,but "R" rated
This movie is excellently cast, directed and filmed. However, it went from a film that could have been used for educational purposes to one you hide from your young children by the insertion of two scenes of women's bare breasts that were totally unnecessary! That was my only disappointment. As a teacher, you always look for excellent resources that can be used in the classroom. If those two totally unnecessary scenes had been done differently (which they easily could), this film could have been ... Read More
Rating:  - Human nature against New inventions.
As a veteran Airman ( I used to be a Combat Pilot for over 40 years ) and today the President of an Avionics Development and Production Company, I was exposed time and again to bureaucratic friction which works against any new invention. During my life time ( I am now 65 years old ) I have learnt that this phenomenom repeats itself through mankind history. It seams that the only thing that has changed is technology, while human nature remained the same.
The film "Longitude" and book are both a ... Read More
Rating: - Longitude
I had seen this video before purchasing my copy. I must admit that I have a vested interest in this movie because the main character John Harrison, rural clockmaker and maker of the chronometer which was used by the British Navy to plot Longitude is my 6th Grandfather!!!! My sister, a geneologist had only recently come to research this fact and told us about it.
It is a classic tale of how a person's perseverance can affect the lives of many. The fact that he had to spend 40 years of his life fighting ... Read More
Rating:  - Disappointed
This movie contains two plot lines - one in the 17th century as a clockmaker tries to solve the problem on determining longitude, and the other a modern (50's) plot about a man trying to reconstruct the original devices made by the clockmaker and also put his own life together. I found the way the director cut from plot to plot distracting and made it hard to follow either plot. While I believe the story is close to historically correct, the jumping between plot line made the stories significantly less enjoyable ... Read More
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