Category: British

Not everything we love the first time we see it holds up over time. But I recently rewatched an ITV series I first enjoyed when it debuted in 1991 and it was every bit as suspenseful, and compelling as I remembered: Prime Suspect.

The first episode introduces us to Jane Tennison, one of British television’s immortal characters. Played by the estimable Dame Helen Mirren, at the opening of the series Tennison is a Detective Chief Inspector who is crushed against the glass ceiling. Neither the men above and below her in the hierarchy take her seriously, so much so that when a male DCI suddenly is unable to continue a murder investigation, she still has to fight her skeptical boss (John Benfield) not to be skipped over in favor of a male investigator from outside the nick.

On its face, the case she is assigned to crack looks a straightforward investigation of a prostitute murdered by a punter. When Tennison begins to suspect that there is more here than meets the eye, her male colleagues resist her conclusions. She is particularly challenged, undermined and mocked by Detective Sergeant Utley (a very credible Tom Bell), who at first seems motivated only by misogyny but things become more complex from there. As Tennison works relentlessly to solve the case and win over her male doubters, her romantic relationship with a divorced father (a pre-fame Tom Wilkinson) begins to suffer.

Prime Suspect is the work of many talented people, but its greatness derives mainly from two phenomenally talented women, namely Mirren and writer Lynda La Plante. Mirren shows enormous range as she brings across Tennison’s toughness, intelligence, ambition, vulnerability and isolation. Tennison is a flawed person, but Mirren makes you pull for her with all your might.

This is also a credit a course to La Plante, who created the character (based on real-life copper Jackie Malton) and the grim and twisty mystery that Tennison tries to solve. La Plante’s script is painfully realistic about what it’s like for the first women who venture into all-male preserves. Notably, she is too talented a writer to give us a Hollywoodized fairy tale of policework adopting a female-friendly work culture to accommodate Tenison. Rather, what happens over the course of the story is that Tennison becomes more like the men around her: ruthless, hard-bitten, neglectful of family and most crucially a heavy boozer (which takes an increasing toll in future episodes). La Plante knows that big organizations change the individuals within them far more the reverse. The development of that theme over the series is one of many reasons why Prime Suspect is widely regarded as a classic of British television.

p.s. This review focuses on the debut episode, but the series ultimately produced 6 more episodes over the next 15 years. All of the follow-up episodes are very good, with my favorite being The Scent of Darkness. In contrast, the spin-off 2017 prequel can’t hold a candle to the original.

p.p.s. Look fast for a pre-fame Ralph Fiennes as an ex-boyfriend of the deceased.

The story of the Titanic is so well-known today (not least due to James Cameron’s mega-budget mega-hit 1997 movie) that the The Onion could run the headline “World’s largest metaphor hits iceberg” confident that everyone would get the joke. But the modern cultural obsession with Titanic goes back less than 70 years. The liner’s sinking was worldwide news in 1912, but two world wars and four decades later, it had faded in popular memory. This changed in 1955, when a virtually unknown advertising copywriter named Walter Lord published a riveting minute by minute account of the disaster based on historical archives and interviews with survivors. A Night to Remember quickly became an international best-seller and has never been out of print since. Producer William MacQuitty, who had seen the launch of the mighty ship as a child, knew an opportunity when he saw it, and with input from Lord made one of the greatest films in British cinema history, 1958’s A Night to Remember.

This would normally be the part of the review where I summarize the plot, but that would be supererogatory here. How the story unfolds in the excellent script by Eric Ambler (who also wrote the script for another of my seagoing recommendations, The Cruel Sea) is however worthy of description. Setting the template for countless subsequent disaster films, the movie intersplices the main event with small moments of human drama, brilliantly carried off by an army of British actors under the direction of Roy Ward Baker, who never rose to a greater height.

Kenneth More, perhaps Britain’s biggest movie star at the time, convincingly leads a matchless cast as the resourceful, brave, and dutiful Second Officer Lightoller (who was like most of the characters in this docudrama film, was a real person). I also admired Laurence Naismith’s turn as the captain of the doomed ship, particularly how much emotion and thought he conveys without words. Of the character parts, John Merivale as Robbie Lucas saying goodbye to his wife Liz (Honor Blackman) and their little children with false assurances that he will see them ripped my heart out. Another unforgettable moment: Ronald Allen leading fellow working class passengers from steerage in a desperate run for the boats until all of them stop in their tracks, dazzled by the sight of the opulent first-class dining room.

Of course a movie like this needs visual spectacle to work, and a Night to Remember is a huge success on that front. The budget was well-spent on lavish, realistic sets, including some that tilted with such convincing groans from their machinery that these sounds were left in the film to convey the heaving of the ship. The special effects are out of date of course, but still credible. And Geoffrey Unsworth, soon to become one of Britain’s most respected cinematographers, is in fine form (I have highlighted his other work here, here, and here) N.B. Be sure to see the Criterion Collection restored version and not one of the battered prints that circulated for decades.

A Night to Remember was a hit in Britain, but didn’t draw much of an audience in the United States, perhaps because it’s so very British in sensibility and also because it gave the American passengers little attention (the most visible being the Unsinkable Molly Brown, who is played by Tucker McGuire mainly as comic relief). But its critical reception was very warm indeed and it is today justly appreciated internationally as a cinematic masterwork.

p.s. Trivia for spy film fans: this film is packed with future espionage stars including Blackman (The Avengers and Goldfinger), David McCallum (The Man from U.N.C.L.E.) and no less than 4 men who went on to play Q in James Bond films.

I ventured that Tinker, Tailor, Solider, Spy is the best thing the BBC has ever put on television. If asked the same question for ITV, on most days I would plump for the 1981 mini-series Brideshead Revisited.

As everyone knows – or should know – the story is based on a semi-autobiographical novel by Evelyn Waugh. The plot is a series of recollections by Charles Ryder of his long, complicated, and life-changing relationship with a Catholic, aristocratic family who are the heriditary owners of a magnificant house and estate known as Brideshead. In the early 1920s, Charles (Jeremy Irons) is charmed by his eccentric, rich, and gorgeous Oxford classmate Lord Sebastian Flyte (Anthony Andrews). Despite their differences in religion and social class, an intimate friendship blossoms, to the point that Charles is eventually almost adopted into Sebastian’s family at Brideshead, which includes his glamorous sister Julia (Diana Quick).

But as the years roll by, Sebastian and Charles’ friendship founders on the former’s self-hatred, resentment of his family, and growing addiction to alcohol. Charles is pained by the loss of closeness with Sebastian, but comforted when Julia steps in to replace it. All of this unfolds as the country is enduring two tumultuous decades when old certanties were overturned and traditional hierarchies undermined.

All three leads sparkle throughout this sweeping series. Remarkably, Irons was originally cast as Sebastian, but agreed to switch roles at Andrews’ request. Their skills as actors is such that it’s now impossible to imagine the casting any other way. Remarkably, due to a technician’s strike bringing ITV to a halt in the middle of making the series, the original director (Michael Lindsay-Hogg) had to be replaced by Charles Sturridge, yet the acting and tone do not miss a beat across those episodes.

Appropriately for a multi-generational story, the cast includes leading lights of a prior era. Laurence Olivier appears as Lord Marchmain, though he isn’t given a great deal to do. Two other famous performers light up the proceedings much more. John Gielgud is both hilarious and a bit terrifying as Charles’ waspish father, who knows how to effortlessly and mercilessly inflict a withering remark. Claire Bloom (last seen on these pages in The Spy Who Came in From the Cold) is also quite effective as Lady Marchmane, the family matriarch. Bloom’s is a rich characterization, mixing virtues and vanities as she grapples with the decline of her son’s health, her religion, and her family’s fortunes.

The less-familiar cast members also shine, including Simon Jones as the stuffy family heir “Bridey”, Phoebe Nicholls as the compassionate youngest child Cordelia, and Nickolas Grace in an endearingly campy turn as Charles and Sebastian’s flamboyant friend Anthony Blanche.

Producer Derek Granger and his team at Granada Television also hit it for six with peerless sets, clothing, cars, makeup artistry, and locations. Geoffrey Burgon’s regal yet wistful baroque theme music is another asset.

What, in the end, is this 13-hour wonder about? Certainly more than one thing. In some respects it’s a nostalgic toff-a-logue like Downtown Abbey (except that it’s good). If you want sympathy for working people you will not find it here: the only mention of labor rights is when Charles helps put down a strike. The mini-series is also an exploration of Catholic life in Protestant-dominated England as well as a compelling narrative of how families change over time in response to marriages, deaths, and historical events.

Most of all, I consider Brideshead Revisited a story about friendship. You can read a pile of critical debates about whether Charles and Sebastian are lovers and indeed the series itself invites such discussion: a dance hall prostitute calls them gay and Lord Marchmain’s mistress (Stéphane Audran) delivers a speech about the English tradition of romantic but not sexual relationships between men. But it doesn’t in my opinion matter, because Irons and Andrews are so sympathetic and believeable as they illuminate how the friendships we make when we are young form and how they change us and then change themselves. And Quick dancing in and around their friendship while managing her love for both men feels utterly real.

Even with this longer than usual review, I really haven’t done complete justice to Brideshead Revisited. If you watch it yourself you will see more things to appreciate than I could cover here, and understand why it remains one of the most respected and beloved shows in British television history.

p.s. Were I asked what else in ITV’s history might compete for the top spot with Brideshead Revisited, I would include the superb mini-series Anthony Andrews starred in just before it: Danger UXB.

I’ve only been to a few English football matches in my life, and like most people who didn’t grow up with it, I don’t find it as engaging as do the locals. Yet one of my all-time favorite sports movies is about English football, which is a testament to the skills of everyone involved in The Damned United.

The plot of this fact-based 2009 film: Brian Clough (Michael Sheen) is a cocky, quotable ex-football star who establishes his brilliance as a manager by leading the once pathetic Derby County club to greatness. Throughout his rise he makes no secret of his contempt of mighty Leeds United and of their legendary coach Don Revie (Colm Meaney) whom he believes snubbed him. In a shocking twist of fate, when Revie departs to coach England’s national team, Clough is tapped to manage the squad he has denigrated, and accepts with the goal of remaking the team in his image and proving that he is superior to Levie in every way. But his arrogance leads him to grossly overestimate how easy the task will be.

Frequent Sheen collaborator Peter Morgan was one of the producers and also wrote the script (They also also made another of my recommendations, The Special Relationship). Based on a novel that many people thought was scurrilous (author David Peace was successfully sued for libel), Morgan’s script makes Clough more sympathetic and integrates many choice quotes that Clough and those around him said at the time. Kudos to Morgan and to director Tom Hooper for their skills as storytellers, particularly in going back and forward in time while never losing narrative momentum. Hooper would win the directing Oscar for his next film, The King’s Speech, but he’s in just as fine form here.

Sheen again shows his facility for playing characters based on real people. He gets Clough’s mannerisms and almost sing-song Northern speech cadence right, and fleshes him out as a rounded person with clear defects and impressive strengths. The supporting performances are excellent, with Timothy Spall being particularly endearing as Assistant Manager Peter Taylor, whom Clough needs to succeed more than his ego can readily concede. Hats off as well to everyone involved in location scouting, set design, costuming, and art direction for visually transporting us convicingly back to the hard-scrabble period that was England in the 1970s.

As I mentioned, you don’t need to know anything about English football in general or the specific events portrayed to appreciate this movie. As long as you appreciate a well-acted, well-told story, with vivid characters, The Damned United is for you.

Alec Guinness so inhabited the role of John le Carré’s master spy George Smiley that even the author said he could no longer think of one without the other. But Guinness was not the only fine actor to essay the role. James Mason also had his turn, even though for copyright reasons the character was renamed Charles Dobbs. The resulting 1967 film has been almost completely forgotten, but it more than merits a revival: The Deadly Affair.

The plot: Put-upon and dutiful spook Charles Dobbs is given an assignment that seems a doddle. An anonymous letter has accused a recently promoted Foreign Office official named Samuel Fennan (Robert Flemyng) of being a security risk, based on his long ago flirtation with Communism as a university student. Dobbs’ discussion with Fennan raises no concerns and even seems enjoyable to both men. But Dobbs learns through his “Adviser” (Max Adrian) that Fennan apparently went home and shot himself! When Dobbs interviews Fennan’s widow (Simone Signoret), something strange happens that raises suspicions that things are not so simple, so Dobbs digs deeper with the aid of an aged but reliable copper (Harry Andrews). Meanwhile, on the home front, Dobbs tries to endure the many affairs of his wife Ann (Harriett Andersson), including one with an undercover operative he used to run that he still considers a friend (Maximilian Schell).

As you can gather from the above, there’s a great deal of talent in front of the camera here (And I didn’t even mention Roy Kinnear, who shines here as an underworld figure in a performance with superb physicality). Mason gives more fiery frustration to Smiley than did Guinness, both in his work and in his failing marriage. I also love his artful interactions with Signoret (as good here as I ever seen her) as he steadfastly uncovers the truth. Andrews, a gay man who ironically spent much of his career playing dead butch British military officers and other authority figures, is also terrific in support as a police officer in the twilight of his career but still retaining intelligence and toughness. Because his is probably the most relatable character in the story and his performance of it so assured, the audience is likely to end up caring about him more than anyone else.

The team behind the camera is equally impressive. The superb director Sidney Lumet loved actors and knew what to do with them. The script is by Paul Dehn, who won an Oscar co-writing another of my recommendations, Seven Days to Noon. Dehn made some plot simplifications in adapting le Carre’s novel Call for the Dead, which I imagine makes the film more comprehensible to viewers who haven’t read the novel. Dehn also added in subplots about Ann that make her a much more prominent part of the movie than the book. I thought this worked fairly well but le Carré purists may disagree. The other major virtue of the movie is Freddie Young’s cinematography, which used pre-exposed film to create the drab colors and shadowy streets that reinforce the emotional tone of le Carré’s world.

The only thing about this movie I actively disliked was, surprisingly, the score by the great Quincy Jones. Purely as music, its jazzy and memorable, but as a soundtrack, it simply doesn’t match the downbeat story and meditative visuals. Indeed, the disjunction at times is so jarring that it takes the viewer out of the story.

The Deadly Affair is not in the same league as the other le Carré based adaptations I have recommended, The Spy Who Came In From The Cold and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. But those are two of the best spy films ever made, and a movie doesn’t need to ascend to such Olympian heights to be watchable and engrossing. The Deadly Affair definitely clears that bar as a grim, effective, translation of the work of a legendary espionage novel writer and a portrayal of his most famous character.