Based on the short story On the Western Circuit, by Thomas Hardy, first published in 1891.
An illiterate girl who works as a servant to a household convinces her mistress to write love letters in her name addressed to a young barrister she met at a fair.
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This female version of Cyrano de Bergerac is based on a 1972 play which changed several elements of the original short story. Here, the servant's mistress is married; in the short story she was a widow. Her husband, originally a wine merchant, now deals in beer. The servant girl didn't get pregnant in the short story. Here, the master of the house is roughly the same age of his wife, but he is business-obsessed and puts his wife down; in the short story, all we know is that he was older than her and died after three years of marriage, leaving her childless (it's unclear why they don't have children in the movie version). All these changes affect considerably how we should view the characters' behavior. In the short story, the mistress is a real competitor to the servant; here, since she is married, perhaps the whole affair is more life a fantasy she engages in, but we aren't really sure. But the main difference, in my view, is in the barrister's character. In the short story, he is a gentleman. In the movie, the young man is a cad -- he seduced the girl and wouldn't have married her out of obligation alone. The girl, in turn, is also different. In the short story, she is naïve and immature, but not as stupid and selfish as here. Also, she was not a slut. (Note that in Tess of the d'Urbervilles the protagonist is raped, not seduced.)
This TV film is available on YouTube:
The short story it is (loosely) based on is available on Wikisource:
On the Western Circuit - Wikisource, the free online library
Rating: 38
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