Fantastic!

Absolutely Fantastic

It is both painfully honest and laugh-out-loud funny at the same time.

Excellent characters with emotional depth. My wife, daughter and granddaughter all enjoyed it...and me, too! Very good movie! You won't be disappointed.

Ah the Thorn birds saga..i was 12 the year it aired on TV in 1984 in France for the first time because it had many reruns after.I love this saga and miniseries and loved Richard chamberlain the fine priest Ralph who took care of Meggie like a father when she was a child,a very lovely little girl but rejected by her mother and in need of love and affection because of Frank's departure and many deaths in her life..She was a child when she arrived at Drogheda first at Mary carson's property,a bitter and wicked old lady ,the sister of Paddy Cleary who wanted to leave in Australia to see his sister..And through the years Meggie grew up and she fell for Father ralph knowing he was a priest,this poor young red haired girl with grey eyes,in the book the character of Meggie is red and it's very different in the series but it is good though. She madly falls in love with Ralph who at the death of Mary carson will have to choose between Drogheda or the Vatican..and he will choose both of them.He is an ambitious man actually and won't break his vows not even for Meggie..We 'll see his torments and visits at Drogheda after the fire,the kiss the reject then later the coming at the Mueller's then Matlock island where he and Meggie will live three weeks of passionate love like wife and husband but not for long..the birth of Dane who is the son of Ralph,the lies,the betrayals..in fact this saga is the story of different feelings,love ,hatred,jealousy,betrayal and the forgiveness at the end.It is also the story of a love that is IMPOSSIBLE UNATTAINABLE because Ralph is a priest and the internal conflicts in a family which are better described however in the Novel ,the family secrets especially like Fee's secrets which will have a big influence on Meggie's life..As a 46 year old woman now i still love this miniseries but i would kick Ralph if i were Meggie more than once.He is so ambitious and so self centered and full of ambiguity..How can Meggie love a man like him? Ralph isn't the nice man after all when Meggie grows up and more in the book ,he is detestable sometimes and selfish.I feel sad for Meggie now as a woman because i think that if she loved Ralph he didn't love her the same way. SHE SACRIFIED HER LIFE FOR HIM. She didn' love Luke but could have loved another man than Ralph and luke..well ,i won't change the story but Ralph is the man to avoid.He only gave Meggie 3 WEEKS OF HAPPINESS ON AN ISLAND AND A SON but when she said proudly"I have beaten God.I have a part of Ralph that the church will never have"she lost! Moreover a priest that runs after a woman like Meggie on an island is a bit unrealistic..The series is nice but it is just a romance! As a teen it made me dream but not now..

Oh, this is one huge mini-series. But it was one huge novel, too. I first read Colleen McCullogh's novel when I was 13 or so, and loved it. So romantic and they lived on a sheep station in NSW, Australia...as I live on a farm in NSW I connected with it. I still like the novel a lot, of course it's melodrama but it's very well told melodrama and packs a real punch. Oh, yeah and the crux of the story is a young girl, Meggie, and a handsome, ambitious Catholic priest, Ralph de Bricassart, falling passionately in love. But he loves God more. I've always loved the story, with Ralph's ambition and his actual love of the Catholic church, and his position within, robbing him of the one thing that could make him truly divine. And Meggie, much like Rhett Butler, eternally waits and hopes. It's actually considered the Australian GWTW.If you've read the novel, the mini-series changes A LOT of the story around, but I didn't mind so much. The main stuff is there. As it was made for American TV, American actors and some Irish/British were cast, with the one Aussie sticking out a mile (Bryan Brown, whom I like a lot from Aussie TV and films). Rachel Ward is a bit "green" as Meggie (she overdoes many of the early emotional scenes), but she's absolutely gorgeous, vulnerable in the early scenes, and memorably hardened in the later. Richard Chamberlain was phenomenal as Ralph de Bricassart. He was everything I pictured the character to be, and really understood the character. Classics fans will love seeing Jean Simmons and Barbara Stanwyck square off as Fee Clearly and Mary Carson, respectively. It was shot in America, so the great Aussie plains (it's set near the fictional Gillanbone in northern NSW, which I have always thought is a substitute for Bourke or Walgett)are "faked", but I can forgive it. Even though the sheep are all wrong (the Cleary's had Merinos, not bloody Suffolks and some things that look Dorpers! I am from a sheep farm so I take special notice), and the fire mysteriously burns everything green. But they got the shearing method right, so that's okay. I laughed, I cried, it was great viewing8/10

I have read the novel of "The Thorn Birds" and i love this novel a lot, just i wish to have the chance to see the movie or the series.i advise every one to read the novel. and i than Colleen McCullough for her genius brain. so if any one knows where i can find this series i will be thankful. please send me the link and i will download it. and any news about this novel tell me about it i wish Colleen McCullough all the best.i have to talk about the TV series but i didn't see it, please some one tell me what to do. it is difficult to talk about something you didn't see, but i will try my best and i will write about this TV series when i see it in the future so enough talking about it.thanks

I believe the Thorn Birds to be the absolute best romance of all time! It has unrequited love, tragedy, passion, retribution and a love which is haunting and forever. The Australian Outback, Greece, Rome and London are the backdrops of this tragic, passionate, fantastic film.Rachel Ward and Richard Chamberlain deliver the best performances of their careers as lovestruck, tragic Meggie Clearly and confused, ambitious Father Ralph deBricassart. Other notable actors include Jean Simmons as Fiona Cleary, Meggie's mother, who watches her daughter make so many of the same mistakes she made in her life. Christopher Plummer as Vittorio the Cardinal is a great morality mirror for Ralph. One cannot also forget to mention Barbara Stanwyck as the conniving Mary Carson who sets up so much heartache and tragedy, even from the grave. The moral and lesson of the series is to ask how much of our lives we choose and how much is already decided for us? Will each generation make the same mistakes the previous did? Fiona makes the mistake of never having the man she loves but loving his son more than her other children. Meggie loves a man who is unattainable and makes many of the same mistakes her mother did. It is only up to Justine, Meggie's daughter, to attempt to break the cycle.If you have not seen this, you MUST!! It is on DVD which makes it even better for those scenes you just cannot get enough of! Henry Mancini's soundtrack is the perfect backdrop for the movies most poignant scenes.