December 10, 2000

A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS  Great Britain, 1966. Color. Rated G. 120 Minutes. Directed by Fred Zinnemann. Starring Paul Scofield, Wendy Hiller, Robert Shaw.

This historical drama about the close friendship and fatal estrangement of Sir Thomas More (Paul Scofield) and English King Henry VIII (Robert Shaw) won Oscars for best-picture, director (Fred Zinnemann), and screenplay adapted from another medium (Robert Bolt). It also won an Oscar for Scofield and Oscar nominations for Shaw and Wendy Hiller, who played More's wife, Alice. CineBooks, which gives the movie five stars, notes: "The studio took a large gamble when it agreed to film Robert Bolt's play [about] Sir Thomas More, a Catholic statesman in England who rebelled against Henry VIII's self-proclaimed status as the head of the Church of England and paid for his religious beliefs by having his head exhibited on London Bridge. It took six years to get the story on the screen. The wait was worth it."