Not the cheeriest of tales

This film was probably Jeremy irons' swansong as a romantic lead (before his Dorian Gray moment came and he started playing rather weaselly characters instead). It's a grim fable in which Irons, a New Hampshire schoolteacher by his forties, begins regaling his English class with salacious tales from his teens, and nearly gets into trouble for doing so. Before long it is clear that his past is haunting him, and he winds up taking some of his young charges on a trip back in time to the bleak East Anglian landscapes where this psychodrama unfolded. The book was a big hit in its day I seem to remember - always a tough act for a filmmaker to follow...