Under Milk Wood [1971]

See Larger Image	List Price: £15.99 Our Price: £4.98 Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours Manufacturer: Universal Pictures UK Starring: Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor, Peter O'Toole Directed By: Andrew Sinclair Average Customer Rating:


Aspect Ratio: 1.77:1 Audience Rating: Suitable for 15 years and over Binding: DVD EAN: 5050582110227 Format: PAL Label: Universal Pictures UK Manufacturer: Universal Pictures UK Number Of Items: 1 Publisher: Universal Pictures UK Region Code: 2 Release Date: 2003-10-20 Running Time: 88 Studio: Universal Pictures UK Theatrical Release Date: 1971
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Editorial Reviews: Under Milk Woodn is an imaginative, cinematic rendering of Dylan Thomas's famous "play for voices," typically read on stage by a handful of actors expressing the dialogue of more than 50 characters living in a small, Welsh fishing village. Filmmaker Andrew Sinclair sets the story in a real seaside community and visually complements the text's lengthy, opening narration by enlisting Richard Burton both for his brooding voiceover and a mysterious, on-screen role as a drunken gadabout soaking in the very soul of the town Thomas' words describe. Once the narration ends, the film breathes freely with a succession of lively vignettes, some funny, some dramatic, but all rooted in the peculiar circumstances of characters who either feel trapped by or ensconced in their home. Peter O'Toole plays the wizened, blind Captain Cat, haunted by memories of drowned sailors but so attuned to the sounds of village life outside his window he can identify the children screaming in a park. Elizabeth Taylor (Burton's wife at the time) makes a brief appearance as Rosie Probert, and the other players include Glynis Johns, Vivien Merchant, and Victor Spinetti. --Tom Keogh
Spotlight customer reviews: Customer Rating: Summary: It doesn't really work Comment: If you know the voice-only versions of this play, this is disappointing. The viewer's imagination does it all so much better: I want to imagine Rosie Probert in any way I fancy, not to have an image of Elizabeth Taylor's acting in my head whenever I hear her words. The film adds quite unnecessary extras to the original, in an attempt to give the text some sort of rational context. When listening to the play we can quite happily accept the narrators (First Voice and Second Voice) as disembodied observers. In the film there are awkward contrivances such as a coachload of sightseers and Burton meeting a girlfriend for a quick bonk in the afternoon to explain the narrators' presence. It's not just that those additions are instrusively out of context, but far worse they waste precious time which could be spent savouring the magnificent words of Dylan Thomas! Of course, the basics are still there. No amount of sometimes clumsy images will destroy the glory of the original text, or the joy of listening to Burton and many of the other characters. If you love language, don't miss experiencing Under Milkwood in any and every way you can, even this version. But best of all sit back, close your eyes, listen to all the glorious, tumbling, entrancing words of one of the audio versions (both those of Richard Burton and Anthony Hopkins are worth owning) and give your imagination free rein. Customer Rating: Summary: Praise the Lord who made porridge ! Comment: One day in a small village along the coast of Wales, a fishing harbour that is surviving in coming modernity that is going to destroy it and later on transform it. The film enables the director to create a real world extracted from Dylan Thomas's words, and the general description of the historical heritage of the village can be uttered by some guide on a bus half full of old ladies touristing around the country and the conclusion is the village can get levelled down no one would protest. That was a long time ago. Since then these small fishing villages on the Welsh coast have become seaside resorts for all kinds of rich people. Dylan Thomas tries to recreate the life of the village the way he remembers it. The film shifts the observing eye from the author to first a couple of unnamed male strangers going through the village and saying absolutely nothing, hence being pure creations in this film to focus especially on one observer, through whose ears and blind eyes we can discover everything, Captain Cap. This is also a great shift in the point of view of the poem. The medium is the message and the camera imposes its own point of view. I will definitely say it is a good thing to visualize the poem that is otherwise difficult to follow, but at the very same time it is imposing one interpretation, one reading onto the poem, a linear reading that does not accept contradictions and multifariousness. Personally I think a poem should not be visualized on a screen. It must remain language. A recording of this language is already reducing the number of possible readings, but it cannot really reduce it to one reading. Images often do because no matter what you may say, it is them that will come out first and last, dominant, number one. You may call a fish a cat, it will be what the image says and if the image is that of a fish, it will not be a cat. Whereas the word can accept metaphorical transpositions and displacements and even distortions. Images do not accept metaphors very easily except through ellipses, which are more metonymies than matephors, whereas words can easily express sleepless green ideas that sleep furiously. Yet the film is interesting because the editing makes us jump from one place to so many others with hardly one blink of one eye that we get a little bit dizzy and that is supposed to create in us a certain nostalgic feeling for the past, the long gone and forgotten and lost past. Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University of Paris Dauphine & University of Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne Customer Rating: Summary: Fun and games in the village.... Comment: If you find yourself laughing when you view this filmed version of UNDER MILK WOOD then good on ya mate, 'cause that's the response Dylan Thomas was looking for. To be sure, under all the humourous ironies, core qualities of small town Welsh life show through, although the tour group who come to town can't see them from behind their pseudo-sophistication. This is no, "Quick trip Marge", kind of movie. The moving pictures are woven together with poetic imagery and a rich text which will entertain the viewer as much as a Shakespearian play could over a lifetime.the cast displays timeless class. See it. Enjoy it. Savor it. Customer Rating: Summary: David (Touch of Frost )Jason at his Best Comment: If you enjoyed reading or listening to Dylans play then the film is a must.With an all star cast of Richard Burton,Elizabeth Taylor,Ryan Davies,Victor Spinetti,Ruth Madoc,and a very young looking Sir David Jason as No Good Boyo.I almost forgot Peter Otoole as blind Captain Cat. All this was filmed in Fishguard West Wales 37yrs ago but it brings Dylans play to life. To really appreciate the meaning of the play you must see this highly entertaining film. Having read the play seeing the film is a revalation. IT IS A MUST SEE WITH RICHARD BURTONS RICH VOICE AND RYAN DAVIES NOT LONG BEFORE HIS DEATH BUY THIS FILM!! Customer Rating: Summary: Disappointing Comment: Based on Dylan Thomas's radio "play for voices", after his death made into a stage play, and now filmed, this is rather disappointing. It has some good wordage, but is visually lacking and often hard to follow. Richard Burton narrates, and wanders around trying to look poetic, but if you think Peter O'Toole and Elizabeth Taylor have meaningful roles you are mistaken. The former says little and the latter sayis nothing. It's all very stagey and static. More Reviews