This superlative Masterpiece Theatre presentation from the late 1970s, produced by the BBC, magnificently dramatizes Thomas Hardy's classic novel of human character, fate, and poetic justice. Alan Bates stars as Michael Henchard, a man who, on a drunken impulse, sells his wife and child at a country fair-and who, when they seek him out years later, is cast into a tragedy of Shakespearean proportions.