Equus Details

Peter Shaffer's powerful play — about a boy whose repressed emotions lead him to blind six horses — was so acclaimed that it was inevitable it would become a film. However, this is very much a theatrical piece, and the set pieces that work so well on stage lose much of their impact on screen. For example, the long speeches delivered by psychiatrist Richard Burton hold theatre audiences spellbound, but here seem as flatly staged as a party political broadcast. Peter Firth is clearly in awe of Burton, and director Sidney Lumet has too much respect for the text.

Overlong film version of a play which was a succès d'estime; it makes the fatal mistake of showing the tragic events realistically instead of stylistically as was done on the stage, and as a study in abnormal psychology it is scarcely gripping or r