Just watched...

Far From the Madding Crowd, the 2015 remake of the 1967 Julie Christie pic. It was in the queue, so I watched it, sort of not-really-paying attention. It had a few funny moments, and it wasn't poorly acted or ugly on the screen, so I kept watching it. It looks like it was made for television, though. There are scene fade-outs that look like perfect commercial breaks. And it absolutely telegraphs when there's about to be a "big moment". The first "big moment" arrived, and I was talking to the dude and his dog, telling them what was about to happen. They didn't listen, but it happened as I said it would.

Stephen got home from work and, after feeding himself, he sat down to watch it with me. That made two of us, telling Carey Mulligan what was about to happen (or at least, what we felt would be best). Carey didn't listen to us, either, but the things we were predicting or wishing for did, in fact, happen, shortly after we had proclaimed them.

So it's predictable. It's based on Thomas Hardy's book, and I'm not a reader. It's almost an hour shorter than the 1967 version, so I'm glad I never watched that one. I'm not sure I can agree with the one IMDb reviewer who gave it ten out of ten stars, who claimed that "The film does exactly what it says on the tin in a wonderful and sumptuous and breathtaking way and it's one of those films that will stick with me for a long, long time", but I enjoyed her review at least as much as I enjoyed this movie.

I think if it shows up in your DVR queue, you could easily watch something worse, or that is more of a waste of your time. You could also easily watch something better, too, though.

And that's all I have to say about that.