Spanning several generations, Buddenbrooks is the sweeping tale of the rise and fall of a wealthy German merchant family. Plagued by unsuccessful business decisions, disastrous marriages and personal tragedies, the Buddenbrooks family finds themselves in danger of losing their fortune as well as their souls in this “sumptuous production” (The New York Times) of Thomas Mann’s most famous work. Begins at the end of the Georgian era and moves into the Victorian period.
Starring Ruth Leuwerik, Carl Raddatz, Dieter Kirchlechner, Volkert Kraeft, Reinhild Solf, Carl Raddatz and Katharina Brauren.
Note: Willow and Thatch has the good fortune of owning Thomas Mann’s Buddenbrooks on DVD (as linked here it is Region 1, playable in the US) and found the series to be engrossing. The production value is so high it feels as if this has been made recently, and not in the late 1970s. Not an exactly uplifting story, but one that is well worth your time, incidentally portraying the manner of life and mores of the Hanseatic bourgeoisie in the years from 1835 to 1877. Mann drew deeply from the history of his own family, the Mann family of Lübeck, and their milieu.
In German with English subtitles.