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List Price: $19.95Amazon.com's Price: $14.99 You Save: $4.96 (25%)Prices subject to change.
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Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
Audience Rating: Unrated
Binding: DVD
EAN: 9781593753924
Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD-Video, NTSC
ISBN: 1593753926
Label: WGBH BOSTON
Manufacturer: WGBH BOSTON
Number Of Items: 1
Publisher: WGBH BOSTON
Region Code: 1
Release Date: October 25, 2005
Running Time: 120 minutes
Sales Rank: 43059
Studio: WGBH BOSTON
Theatrical Release Date: April 05, 1998
Editorial Review:
Description:
Set in the late 19th century, this adaptation of Wilkie Collins' mystery thriller is a slowly unraveling nightmare that reveals a dark world of powerful and dangerous men.
A young drawing master, Mr. Hartright (Andrew Lincoln), is hired by the fretful Mr. Fairlie (Ian Richardson) to teach his two nieces, Marian (Tara Fitzgerald) and Laura (Justine Waddell). On his way to their house, Hartright is startled by a mysterious encounter with a ghostly woman dressed in white.
When he meets Fairlie's nieces, he is struck by Laura's resemblance to the woman in white, and tells Marian and Laura of the ethereal woman. Determined to learn all they can about the woman in white, the girls find themselves drawn into a vortex of secrets, crime and treacherous involvement with the fascinating, but sinister, Count Fosco (Simon Callow).
Amazon.com:
Wilkie Collins is hot. One of the most underrated Victorian mystery writers, Collins offers up eerie, evocative tales. While The Moonstone may be his best-known novel (it was made into a 1996 telefilm starring Sense and Sensibility's Greg Wise), The Woman in White is an equally affecting and engaging tale. A timeless gothic story, it is told from the perspective of Marian (Tara Fitzgerald), who's staying at a villa with her cousin Laura (Justine Waddell). The women become involved with a sympathetic painter and a slew of duplicitous aristocrats, including one played by James Wilby. Then there's that woman (who looks a lot like Laura), cloaked in white, who keeps running around the garden grounds at night. Fitzgerald is far too gorgeous to be the plain Marian, heroine of the novel, but costumers make a valiant--if unsuccessful--attempt to make her look dowdy and less attractive than Waddell. Fitzgerald is so lovely and likable that audiences are easily drawn into her predicament. Who is the mysterious woman in white? How and why has Laura disappeared? Simon Callow is particularly notable as the suave Count Fosco, who may or may not be who he seems to be. The Woman in White was made into a 1982 miniseries and five other film versions. Trivia note: Ian Richardson appears in both the 1982 version and this one. --N.F. Mendoza
Customer Reviews
Average Rating: 
Rating: - Minimalist adaptation of Wilkie Collins classic
Some of you may not have heard of Wilkie Collins. He was a great friend of Charles Dickens. "Women in White" is a novel that was written for Dickens' literary magazine and appeared in serialization about the same time that "A Tale of Two Cities" was also being published.
The novel itself is 720 pages long and has (if memory serves from fifth grade reading) five narrators. This film treatment resolves on a single narrator, Marian Fairlie (Fitzgerald) the half poor sister of Laura, ... Read More
Rating:  - This can be enjoyed as a movie inspired by Wilkie Collin's work, not as an adaptation
If you are a purist or someone who cannot bear to see a favorite book chopped up when translated onto the big screen, then this movie will offend your sensibilities. However, if it is taken as a movie inspired by Wilkie Collins' The Woman In White, or as a very loose adaptation, then one might perhaps enjoy it, as I certainly did.
The story here [I am not going to compare it to the novel for there are many liberties taken with it in this movie version] centers around a pair of half-sisters ... Read More
Rating: - Wonderful adaptation
No, this is not a faithful adaptation, but it is a very good adaptation. As this is a Masterpiece Theatre production, there is an introduction and a conclusion that is included, but not part of the actual film. The conclusion explains why so much of the novel was left out and explains some important plot points of the novel that were excluded from the film. This includes the the "Paris scene" as one reviewer distressingly noted--which ties up the loose ends concerning Count Fosco.
Noting ... Read More
Rating: - A grand Victorian gothic adventure, filled with madness, stratagems, love, graves and dark, dark woods
"The bad dreams always come back again like unwanted friends," says Marion Fairlie, who with her half-sister, Laura, lives in a vast mid-Victorian country estate. "And last night I found myself in Limmeridge churchyard. Normally, people who are dead stay dead, just as normally it is the criminals who are locked up rather than the victims. But then, there was nothing normal about what happened to us..." And we're off on a first-class gothic story of madness, deception and villainy, based on Wilkie Collins' ... Read More
Rating: - Not bad, as a minimalist synopsis of the novel
This is an excellent former Masterpiece Theatre presentation. At only two hours it takes on only the main plot thread of the lengthy original novel, which has been called the first English mystery novel. This two-hour version is fast-paced, suspenseful, atmospheric, and engrossing, but it is the "Cliffs Notes" version at best.The performances are convincing, the production seems high-budget, with many outdoor scenes and lovely costumes and sets. Go to the original novel for wonderful subplots and fascinating, ... Read More
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