Tess

Name: Tess
Genre: Drama, Romance
Released: December 12, 1980
Duration: 186 min
Rating: 82
Cast: Leigh Lawson, Nastassja Kinski, Peter Firth

1980

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Universal acclaim based on 15 Critic Reviews

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USER SCORE

Universal acclaim based on 12 Ratings

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8.5	User Score Universal acclaim based on 12 Ratings

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Tess: Don't Be So Coy (English Dubbed)

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Movie Details & Credits

Columbia Pictures | Release Date: December 12, 1980 | PG

Starring: Leigh Lawson, Nastassja Kinski, Peter Firth

Summary: A young strong-willed peasant girl, becomes the affection of two men, in the end tragically falling into the arms of one.

Director: Roman Polanski

Genre(s): Drama, Romance

Rating: PG

Runtime: 186 min

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Metascore

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Critic Reviews

100

Roger Ebert

This is a wonderful film; the kind of exploration of doomed young sexuality that, like Elvira Madigan, makes us agree that the lovers should never grow old. Read full review

100

Budd Wilkins

Tess is thus an almost unprecedented example of sweeping historical epic that also functions as an intense personal meditation on the capricious vicissitudes of love and death. Read full review

Janet Maslin

A lovely, lyrical, unexpectedly delicate movie. [12 Dec 1980, p.C8]

Keith Phipps

The film, like its source, is filled with pessimistic fatalism, but it spares no pity for the instruments of fate, painting Alec as an irredeemable villain. What, if anything, this meant to Polanski remains unknowable. Read full review

The Guardian Philip French

An outstanding piece of work. Read full review

Staff (Not Credited)

Tess is a sensitive, intelligent screen treatment of a literary masterwork. Roman Polanski has practiced no betrayal in filming Thomas Hardy's 1891 novel, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, and his adaptation often has that infrequent quality of combining fidelity and beauty. Read full review

Staff (Not Credited)

Having all the strengths and excesses of a middlebrow film (visual beauty, lush soundtrack, arty direction), this adaptation's appeal to the senses leaves them cloyed. Read full review

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User Reviews

stanley_

Jun 16, 2019

A Kubrickian movie, every scene is a picture. A giant masterpiece, really unrated!!!

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