TORTURED SOULS ON AN EPIC SCALE : IN PBS ADAPTATION OF `NOSTROMO,' SILVER IS KEY TO SUFFERING, TRIUMPH.

Byline: Knight-Ridder Tribune News Wire

Joseph Conrad's ``Nostromo,'' an epic about colonialism, greed, revolution and honor, has been turned into a lavish six-hour miniseries for ``Masterpiece Theatre.''

Like Conrad's novel, PBS' film is complex and forbidding at times, but rewarding if you stick with it for its soul-stirring finale.

Even if you have trouble keeping its large cast of characters sorted out and its plot developments clear, you will find ``Nostromo'' a seductive journey because of its spectacular settings. It was filmed on location in Colombia, and its haunting music is by the great Italian film composer Ennio Morricone (``Once Upon a Time in the West,'' ``Days of Heaven'').

This is a rare undertaking for television and feels at all times more like a feature film than a TV miniseries. It's the sort of grand-scale drama that a David Lean (``Lawrence of Arabia'') might have made. In fact, Lean was about to film his own version of ``Nostromo,'' collaborating again with screenwriter Robert Bolt, when Lean died in 1991. (The PBS version has no connection with the abandoned Lean project.)

Set in the 1890s, ``Nostromo'' is about what happens when Englishman Charles Gould (Colin Firth) returns to his boyhood home - the fictional South American nation of Costaguana - and reopens the long-neglected silver mine run by his father more than a decade earlier. Gould's father was killed by the revolutionaries who took over the country. This time, Gould has the backing of a syndicate headed by a rich American, Joshua Holroyd (Brian Dennehy). It's a matter of pride to him to succeed where his father failed, no matter what he has to do.

That may mean using the wealth from the silver mine to buy the support of the corrupt regime - even while gaining the support of the workers with fair-minded policies and decent wages. His right-hand man with the working people is his straw boss, a young, honest and hard-working Italian (Claudio Amendola), who's nicknamed ``Nostromo,'' which means ``our man,'' a term that ultimately becomes humiliating to the ambitious young man because it suggests the foreigners own him, body and soul.

When another revolution takes place, the mine is threatened once more, and so is a large cache of silver bars. Gould has no one he can trust to sneak the silver out of the country except the loyal Nostromo, who sets sail with the heavy ingots as the revolutionary troops close in.

Conrad's story is really as much about the nature of the human soul as it is about the vile influence of European and U.S. colonialism on Latin America and the greed of easily corrupted ``revolutionaries'' who care a lot more about their own welfare than the people they lead.

The story centers most on the struggle over the souls of two men: Gould, who becomes obsessed with his silver mine, to the misery of his neglected wife, Emilia (Serena Scott Thomas), and Nostromo, who has promised his surrogate mother (Claudia Cardinale) that he will become an independent man, marry one of her two daughters and protect her.

The difference between the two men, though, is that Gould doesn't agonize so much over the condition of his soul. Nostromo does. He is wary of betraying those who trust him, even when he feels it may be necessary to become the sort of man he was destined to be. His dilemma is an age-old one, and the ways out of it are never comfortable.

Watching over the tug-of-war for their souls is the derelict Dr. Monygham (Albert Finney), who was tortured and broken by the agents of a foreign regime and now lives on as an alcoholic physician one local describes as ``a twisted man with an evil eye.'' Though the doctor considers himself a ruin, he is, in fact, a courageous man whose own soul is battered, but intact.

Co-financed by Boston PBS station WGBH with British, Italian and Spanish partners, ``Nostromo'' tells its story on a broad and beautiful canvas.

The cast is world-class. Amendola is excellent, and Firth, who was so persuasive in last season's ``Pride and Prejudice'' miniseries, once more proves he's one of Britain's top leading men.

THE FACTS

The show: ``Mobil Masterpiece Theater: Joseph Conrad's Nostromo.''

The stars: Claudio Amendola, Colin Firth, Serena Scott Thomas, Albert Finney, Brian Dennehy.

Behind the scenes: Directed by Alastair Reid. Screenplay by John Hale.

When: 9-11 p.m. Sunday, Monday and Tuesday on KCET (Channel 28).

Our rating: Four Stars.

CAPTION(S):

2 Photos

Photo: (1) Emilia and Charles Gould (Serena Scott Thomas and Colin Firth) return to his native Costaguana to get the action going in ``Nostromo'' a six-hour miniseries beginning Sunday on ``Mobil Masterpiece Theatre.''

(2) Albert Finney is the derelict Dr. Monygham, described as ``a twisted man with an evil eye.''