Fortunes of War

Fortunes of War is a 1987 BBC television adaptation of Olivia Manning's cycle of novels of the same name, which stars Kenneth Branagh as Guy Pringle, lecturer in English Literature in Bucharest during the early part of the Second World War, and Emma Thompson as his wife Harriet. Other cast members included Ronald Pickup, Robert Stephens, Alan Bennett, Philip Madoc and Rupert Graves. As a big-budget (it cost $12 million) television drama set in th... more

Fortunes of War is a 1987 BBC television adaptation of Olivia Manning's cycle of novels of the same name, which stars Kenneth Branagh as Guy Pringle, lecturer in English Literature in Bucharest during the early part of the Second World War, and Emma Thompson as his wife Harriet. Other cast members included Ronald Pickup, Robert Stephens, Alan Bennett, Philip Madoc and Rupert Graves. As a big-budget (it cost $12 million) television drama set in the mid 20th century, it was intended as the BBC's response to Granada Television's recent successes with Brideshead Revisited in 1981 and The Jewel in the Crown in 1984. less