Film Reviews by CV

This is self-consciously a popular documentary where presentation is on an equal par with content. Fire is the theme and this motif is omnipresent visually to the point of ridiculous obsession: in interview scenes the camera will suddenly alight on a candle flame or a fire that happens to be burning in a grate. We are constantly being told that it was the greatest fire in London - why would this programme be made if it wasn't? Also there is much gasping, hyperventilation and wild-eyed stares over statistics and measurements that do not mean very much on their own. There was one moment of unintended black humour that I noticed: we were told that the fire reached 1000 C and a moment later that it was recorded that a man had lost his life returning to his house for a blanket! Finally the whole series is marred by a advert break every few minutes - with more burning flames each time.

Three presenters follow the fortunes of three trades people from different classes and so a personal angle is introduced. Although Pepys is referred to it was a pity we didn't hear his firsthand descriptions of the fire which were more terrifying in words than in the mock-up experiments shown in the programme.

As Laurence Olivier observes, it is extraordinary that such music of power and romantic intensity should have emerged from the head of this unlikely genius. Born in relative poverty, went to a rough school, admitted as a chorister by grace, youngest undergraduate of Oxford University since Henry VIII, dropped out and "scrounged" off richer friends, clumsy at playing musical instruments and turned to composition to justify his existence! Hear the music and you will agree with his wife, Susana, that his life and career had a kind of divine inevitability about it. The opening scene shows him at his piano, complaining about the variety of spectacles he has and pointing out where his most important composing device - the eraser - is situated for use! So much said by so little.

This is a very successful project and wonderful testament to the life of the genius Van Gogh. The narrative is the mystery concerning the death of this great artist and aptly told through the visual medium of his artistic style. The portraits come to life and become acting characters inhabiting the other paintings in continuous animation. A very special experience indeed.

This film is a true labour of love where funds were put up by the director and producer themselves, relying on a cast of amateurs bar one professional, where the inspirational content of the film was enough to forget any thought of commercial viability. And there was no compromise on authenticity of period detail either, even down to the employment of contemporary now-rare breeds of pig and chickens!

It is shot in black-and-white enhancing a historical quality and the somewhat deliberate delivery of dialogue and stiffness of manners of the amateur acting is so appropriate for the sobriety and severity of that post-Civil War age.

The bonus material is fascinating, an interview discussing how the film was made and it was quite heartening to see a powerful message, great cinematic and art override any desire for ready-profit.

How well done these classics were in this era compared with the modernistic concepts and watered down dialogue of today. Over seven half-hourly episodes the drama evolved naturally and spaciously including much if not all of the dialogue as I remembered it and faithful to its period language.

It was excellently cast and the minor characters were played so individually. It was refreshing to hear the acoustic of the boom microphone giving natural room sounds rather than the nowadays cheaper arrangement of clothes microphones which destroy all sonic perspective. The music, hardly more than a few improvised chords as a signature tune, with its few sour chords at the close, reflected the story to come so subtly and unobtrusively.

I have seen many adaptations of classics and this is one was a lovely surprise as I had not known of its existence. Faithful to the spirit of Jane Austen and a true yet subtle enaction of this great novel.

Writing as a Christian believer myself I am afraid I have to say that this was a bad film in many ways. The characterisations were flat cartoon-like caricatures, the soap-opera-like slew of dramatic incident and relationship issues were completely unbelievable and the stereotypical Christian life-experience just did not ring true. When evaluating a film it will not do to judge it on its intentions, noble and well-meaning no doubt they were but on its artistic and dramatic integrity of which this film falls far short.

There is so much tub-thumping that one feels preached at and patronised as everything is spelt out so graphically: the atheist professor is depicted as a kind of Medieval Mystery Play devil while the believing student is very carefully portrayed as meek, extremely-well read and knowledgeable, a David and Goliath parallel. Amy is loneliness personified, the professor's partner, Mina, the downtrodden and persecuted angel-like figure; you also have the patient Pastor Dave and his jolly friend who embraces all frustration with a "God is good" and beaming smile. All these figures could be the stock conventional characters in a play like Everyman which little human depth. As the film is supposed to be real and convincing I am afraid it fails.

The already established relationships between the professor and his partner and that between Josh and his girlfriend seem to have had an impossible pre-history. The first relationship one would assume to have been sexual, (inconsistent behaviour with the saintly Mina) and the second one raises the question of whether there had been discussion of what Josh's faith means to him. Do I not understand American culture or would a professor's guests at a dinner party really all openly humiliate his partner; would a highly intellectual professor get so emotional in front of his class: would Mina (an exemplary Christian we are to believe) storm into her partner's place of work, rudely interrupt a conversation and blast a very personal matter in public? Why were was Pastor Dave so blase after the fatal traffic accident? I could go on.

There are many incidents themselves such as the repeated car failure that are so contrived and eventually become predictable,

The final scene where every Christian introduced in the film flocks to a Christian rock concert and are seen dancing in near ecstasy gives the impression that this is the zenith of Christian experience. Personally, I prefer a Bach cantata, poetry and the quietness of nature for spiritual uplift which seems a million miles from the depiction of Christian living in this film! It is very uncomfortable to have to give this film a low mark with its honest motives but this film, obviously not fantasy, has to meet the same standards of any other film and sadly this one is a long way behind.

This film feels like a news-reel presentation. There is an objective remoteness which makes the film quite distinctive and I can hardly remember any character by name as we feel quite detached from their involvement though we observe their actions very closely. There are some interesting details such as the ducking of bomb blasts en masse, the floating Spitfire that has run out of fuel and the underwater scenes.