Synopsis
Tess of the D'Urbervilles (2008) is a four-part BBC miniseries you can watch online on iFILM, adapted from Thomas Hardy's 1891 novel. Gemma Arterton plays Tess Durbeyfield, a country girl whose family's discovery of a supposedly noble lineage sets off a chain of events she never chose.
When Tess is sent to seek out wealthy relatives among the Stoke-D'Urbervilles, she meets Alec (Hans Matheson) — and what follows marks her permanently in ways Victorian society refuses to reconsider. Angel Clare (Eddie Redmayne), the idealist she later loves, turns out to have principles that apply differently depending on who sinned. Hardy's critique still lands because nothing about the logic has dated.
Director David Blair keeps Hardy's bleak reasoning without softening it into costume drama. Arterton carries the weight without theatre. Redmayne, years before his Oscar, gives Angel's self-righteousness a quietly unsettling precision. Stream Tess of the D'Urbervilles online on iFILM.
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