A Tale of Two Cities

IMDb RATING

7.8/10

6.5K

YOUR RATING

Elizabeth Allan, Ronald Colman, and Donald Woods in A Tale of Two Cities (1935)

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Period Drama Drama History Romance

A pair of lookalikes, one a former French aristocrat and the other an alcoholic English lawyer, fall in love with the same woman amidst the turmoil of the French Revolution.A pair of lookalikes, one a former French aristocrat and the other an alcoholic English lawyer, fall in love with the same woman amidst the turmoil of the French Revolution.A pair of lookalikes, one a former French aristocrat and the other an alcoholic English lawyer, fall in love with the same woman amidst the turmoil of the French Revolution.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.8/10

6.5K

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Nominated for 2 Oscars
- 2 nominations total

Trivia
Actor Ronald Colman agreed to play the role of Sydney Carton with the sole condition that he not also be required to play the role of Charles Darnay, as was usually expected in adaptations of the Dickens novel. The plot of 'A Tale of Two Cities' turns on the physical resemblance between the two characters. Colman had long wanted to play Sydney Carton, and was even willing to shave off his beloved mustache to play the part.

Goofs
Sydney Carton attends Christmas Eve services ca. 1780 during which "Hark, the Herald Angels Sing" is sung to music by Felix Mendelssohn (1809-1847), and John Francis Wade's Latin hymn, "Adeste fideles," is sung in Frederick Oakley's (1802-1880) translation as "O Come, All Ye Faithful."

Quotes
Sydney Carton: It's a far, far better thing I do than I have ever done. It's a far, far better rest I go to than I have ever known.

Crazy credits
Although the film has nothing to do with Christmas, "Adeste Fideles," known in English as the holiday carol "O Come All Ye Faithful" plays as a The End title appears on screen.

Connections
Edited into The Story That Couldn't Be Printed (1939)

Soundtracks
La Marseillaise
(1792) (uncredited)
Written by Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle
Played during the opening credits and often in the score

User reviews86

Review

Featured review

8/10

Storming the Bastille, 1930s Style

I haven't read Charles Dickens' famous novel since high school, so I can't remember how faithful this film adaptation is. I'm sure much is excised from the book, as it would have to be in any adaptation that isn't 15 hours long. But as a stand-alone film, this version of "A Tale of Two Cities" is an awfully good one, and contains a lot of entertainment value.

Ronald Colman does most of the heavy lifting and is superb in the lead role. But two stand outs from the supporting cast are Blanche Yurka as the infamous Madame De Farge, the personification of an activist spirit taken to monstrous extremes, and Edna May Oliver, a proper English lady who won't let a few thousand French revolutionaries intimidate her. The best scene of the film is the smack down between the two characters, one of the best cat fights committed to celluloid.

"A Tale of Two Cities" received two Oscar nominations in 1936, one for Best Picture in a year with ten nominees, and the other for its film editing, courtesy of Conrad Nervig, the man who won the very first film editing award when the category was introduced in 1934.

Grade: A