Where Angels Fear to Tread (1991 Charles Sturridge)

Certainly the darkest E.M. Forster adaptation I've seen (by the director, Tim Sullivan and Derek Granger - all involved with A Handful of Dust also), involving an impetuous woman (Helen Mirren) who impulsively marries an Italian dentist (Giovanni Guidelli) and into a life she didn't anticipate. When she dies giving birth, two of her relatives - Rupert Graves and an extremely hysterical Judy Davis - come to bring the baby home, with tragic results. Graves, a self-confessed 'non-doer', falls for determined Helena Bonham Carter, who (we think) is after the child also. Lovely setting in the fictional Monteriano (actually Montepulciano, San Gimignano and Cuna, all in Siena).

It was Forster's first novel, published in 1905 when he was only 26. Did note the irony, probably from the book, that Davis fails to admire the Tuscan scenery because of the train dirt in her eye.

With Barbara Jefford. Terrific music by Rachel Portman and maybe Michael Coulter's finest work as a cinematographer.

It was Victoria Boydell's first job in cinema, as Cutting Room Trainee.