Period Dramas I must watch
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- CreatorJimmy McGovernStarsOrla BradyEwen BremnerMyAnna BuringBritish convicts have been sent to Australia as punishment for their crimes. As they try to live their new lives, they have to live with the new rules. The soldiers also have to adjust.
- StarsBertie CarvelEddie MarsanMarc WarrenIn an alternate history, during the time of real life Napoleonic Wars, two men of destiny, the gifted recluse Mr. Norrell and daring spellcasting novice Jonathan Strange, use magic to help England.
- StarsFrancesca AnnisJustine WaddellBill PatersonThe daughter of a country doctor copes with an unwanted stepmother, an impetuous stepsister, burdensome secrets, the town gossips, and the tug on her own heartstrings for a man who thinks of her only as a friend.
- CreatorSue BirtwistleSusie ConklinStarsJudi DenchImelda StauntonJulia McKenzieIn the 1840s, Cranford is ruled by the ladies. They adore good gossip, and romance and change is in the air, as the unwelcome grasp of the Industrial Revolution rapidly approaches their beloved rural market-town.
- StarsMatthew MacfadyenClaire FoyTom CourtenayThe Dorrits are a family whose life revolves around the Marshalsea, a debtor's prison. Amy Dorrit's kind nature brings the family into contact with a wide swath of English society, from the poorest to the richest, and back again.
- StarsDamian LewisRupert GravesGina McKeeChronicles the lives of three generations of the upper-middle-class British family, the Forsytes, from the 1870s to 1920.
- StarsNatasha LittleFrances GreyPhilip GlenisterAn adaptation of William Makepeace Thackeray's classic story of parvenue Becky Sharp's rise from obscure and humble origins to her subsequent ignominious fall from Society; set against the backdrop of Regency England and continental Europe during the Napoleonic War.
- DirectorMira NairStarsReese WitherspoonRomola GaraiJames PurefoyGrowing up poor in London, Becky Sharp defies her poverty-stricken background and ascends the social ladder alongside her best friend, Amelia Sedley.
- StarsJodhi MayEdward FoxAmanda RootSet in Victorian London, Gwendolen Harleth is drawn to Daniel Deronda, a selfless and intelligent gentleman of unknown parentage, but her own desperate need for financial security may destroy her chance at happiness.
- StarsDouglas HodgeJuliet AubreyTrevyn McDowellMiddlemarch is a story of provincial life on the brink of momentous change and a deeply moving saga about a group of people striving to give meaning and value to their lives during the Industrial Revolution.
- StarsCarla GuginoAlison ElliottMira SorvinoFour American girls go to England to find husbands.
- CreatorHeidi ThomasStarsKeeley HawesEd StoppardAdrian ScarboroughA new family and their servants live at the London townhouse at 165 Eaton Place in 1936.
- DirectorThomas ImbachStarsCamille RutherfordMehdi DehbiSean BiggerstaffA queen who lost three kingdoms. A wife who lost three husbands. A woman who lost her head.
- DirectorAmma AsanteStarsGugu Mbatha-RawMatthew GoodeEmily WatsonThe biracial daughter, Dido Elizabeth Belle (Gugu Mbatha-Raw), of Royal Navy Captain Sir John Lindsay (Matthew Goode) is raised by aristocratic Great-uncle Lord William Murray, 1st Earl of Mansfield (Tom Wilkinson) in 18th century England.
- DirectorRichard LaxtonStarsDakota FanningGreg WiseTom SturridgeA look at the scandalous love triangle between Victorian art critic John Ruskin (Greg Wise), his teenage bride Euphemia "Effie" Gray (Dakota Fanning), and Pre-Raphaelite painter John Everett Millais (Tom Sturridge).
- DirectorFrançois GirardStarsMichael PittKeira KnightleyKoji YakushoThe story of a married silkworm merchant-turned-smuggler in 19th century France traveling to Japan for his town's supply of silkworms after a disease wipes out their African supply. During his stay in Japan, he becomes obsessed with the concubine of a local baron.
- DirectorFrançois OzonStarsRomola GaraiSam NeillLucy RussellThe rise and fall of a young eccentric British writer, in the early 20th century.
- DirectorJane CampionStarsAbbie CornishBen WhishawPaul SchneiderThe three-year romance between 19th-century poet John Keats and Fanny Brawne near the end of his life.
- DirectorNicholas HytnerStarsNigel HawthorneHelen MirrenRupert GravesWhen King George III goes mad, his Lieutenants try to adjust the rules to run the country without his participation.
- DirectorNikolaj ArcelStarsAlicia VikanderMads MikkelsenMikkel Boe FølsgaardA young queen, who is married to an insane king, falls secretly in love with her physician - and together they start a revolution that changes a nation forever.
- DirectorJulian JarroldStarsMatthew GoodePatrick MalahideHayley AtwellA poignant story of forbidden love and the loss of innocence set in England prior to World War II.
- DirectorLaurent TirardStarsRomain DurisFabrice LuchiniLaura MoranteTo satisfy his creditors, a witty actor reinvents himself as a satirical playwright, with uproarious, yet bittersweet, results.
- DirectorAgnieszka HollandStarsKate MaberlyMaggie SmithHeydon ProwseA young, recently-orphaned girl is sent to England after living in India all of her life. Once there, she begins to explore her new, seemingly-isolated surroundings, and its secrets.
- StarsTom HardyCharlotte RileyAndrew LincolnFoundling Heathcliff is raised by the wealthy Earnshaws in Yorkshire but in later life launches a vendetta against the family.
- DirectorJulian JarroldStarsSarah GadonBel PowleyEmily WatsonOn V.E. Day in 1945, as peace extends across Europe, Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret are allowed out to join the celebrations. It is a night full of excitement, danger and the first flutters of romance.
- CreatorPeter BowkerFranny MoyleStarsSamuel BarnettSam CraneJosie FarmiloePeriod drama set in London about the rise of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood.
- DirectorTerrence MalickStarsColin FarrellQ'orianka KilcherChristopher PlummerThe story of the English exploration of Virginia, and of the changing world and loves of Pocahontas.
- DirectorRobert FuestStarsAnna Calder-MarshallTimothy DaltonHarry AndrewsDoomed lovers Catherine and Heathcliff are torn apart by their own selfishness and hate.
- DirectorSarah GavronStarsCarey MulliganAnne-Marie DuffHelena Bonham CarterIn 1912 London, a young working mother is galvanized into radical political activism supporting the right for women to vote, and is willing to meet violence with violence to achieve this end.
- StarsJemima RooperMorven ChristieAlex KingstonAmanda, an ardent Jane Austen fan, lives in present day London with her boyfriend Michael, until she finds she's swapped places with Austen's fictional creation Elizabeth Bennet.
- DirectorClaude ChabrolStarsIsabelle HuppertJean-François BalmerChristophe MalavoyIn nineteenth-century France, the romantic daughter of a country squire marries a dull country doctor. To escape boredom, she throws herself into love affairs with a suave local landowner and a law student, and runs up ruinous debts.
- DirectorTim FywellStarsFrances O'ConnorGreg WiseEileen AtkinsA young woman in her late teens, a reader of novels and with high hopes of romance and passion, marries a widowed country doctor. Although he dotes on her, she is soon bored and discontent. First, she gives her imagination to a law student in town, and next she takes a lover. When he refuses to run away with her, she takes up again with the law clerk. Her spending on dresses and furnishings mounts; these debts and her ill-advised professional counsel to her husband bring his ruin.
- DirectorDavid ThackerStarsCiarán HindsJuliet AubreyJodhi MayA drunken farm worker sells his wife and child at a market and begins a new life of wealth and respect as the Mayor of Casterbridge. However, his past returns to haunt him when he is reunited with his family, with unexpected consequences.
- DirectorJames GrayStarsMarion CotillardJoaquin PhoenixJeremy RennerIn 1921, an innocent immigrant woman is tricked into a life of burlesque and vaudeville until a dazzling magician tries to save her and reunite her with her sister who is being held in the confines of Ellis Island.
- DirectorMike LeighStarsTimothy SpallPaul JessonDorothy AtkinsonAn exploration of the last quarter century of the great, if eccentric, British painter J.M.W. Turner's life.
- StarsTuppence MiddletonSophie RundleAlexandra MoenDrama set within the fictional realms of Charles Dickens critically acclaimed novels, bringing together some of his most iconic characters as their lives intertwine in 19th century London.
- DirectorJed MercurioStarsHolliday GraingerRichard MaddenJames NortonIn 1913 Connie Reid marries wealthy Nottingham colliery owner Sir Clifford Chatterley but he returns from the Great War disabled and in a wheelchair. Connie is loyal but begins to feel alienated as he engages a nurse, Mrs Bolton, and excludes her from pit business. Despite his desire for an heir his impotency results in a lack of sexual activity and Connie is drawn to handsome Oliver Mellors, the plain-spoken former miner her husband has engaged as his game-keeper and who represents the passion she craves. They embark upon a physical affair in Oliver's cottage but are discovered and betrayed by Mrs Bolton. Connie, now carrying Oliver's child, must choose between a pampered but joyless existence with her husband or an uncertain future with the man she has come to love.
- StarsJames NortonEve BestRupert Penry-JonesAn intimate and emotional drama for BBC Two about the revolutionary Bloomsbury group.
- StarsClémence PoésyAlessio BoniAlexander BeyerThe story of five aristocratic families in Russia during the Napoleonic Wars of 1812