Bleak House (BBC)[Region Free]

For once, I am happy to find a remake of a fine old Masterpiece Theatre offering that is as good as the original. "Bleak House" is currently available on an DVD with Diana Rigg as the most familiar name; and except for some incomprehensible line readings by a young character named Joe, it is a very good account of the Dickens novel. Having already appeared on Public Television, the remake has Gillian Anderson (yes, the one from "X-Files") as Lady Dedlock, and a cast of 80 speaking roles, many of which are played by actors that will send you searching the cast listings that go by too quickly at the end of each episode.

The eight parts will be shown so that the first and last will run two hours and the four in between an hour each. I found the complex plot actually easier to follow in this version than I did in the earlier one. And while I prefer Rigg to Anderson, I think I can easily recommend this new adaptation over the other.

The story--lawyers will hate it--involves the infamous Court of Chancery in which disputes over estates can be buried for years until the lawyers' fees make further legalizing unnecessary. Against this background, the case of Jarndyce vs. Jarndyce being a major part of it, we have the story of John Jarndyce (Denis Lawson), his ward Ada (Carey Mulligan), her companion Esther (Anna Maxwell Martin), and Ada's beloved Richard (Patrick Kennedy).

The latter becomes obsessed with the case, while Esther becomes involved in the mysterious past of Lady Dedlock, who happens to recognize the handwriting on some legal documents delivered by the utterly immoral family solicitor Tulkinghorn (Charles Dance). I will not reveal any more of the plot, lest it spoil your enjoyment. You will wind up guessing much of it, but it is a lot of fun--unless you are a lawyer.

Peripheral to the plot are the usual cast of Dickens "characters": Krook the junkman (Johnny Vegas) who finds some incriminating letters (and dies the strangest death in all fiction), Smallweed the moneylender (Phil Davis) who cannot walk by himself and must be "shaken up" by his weird niece every few minutes and who gets the letters, and Miss Flite ( Pauline Collins) who looks forward to "judgment day" when her case will finally be settled and she can set her birds free.

Most interesting of all is the policeman Bucket (Alun Armstong), the first real detective in English fiction. Although he looks like a toady for the rich, he does his job and does it well, solving a murder case and being considerate to a certain lady who would suffer if her connection with the case should come out.

Of course, the arm of coincidence in Dickens is a long one; and while a good deal of the plot does strain credulity, the acting and period ambience are of the highest level. The only thing that annoyed me was the director segmenting his "establishing shots" (exterior views of buildings to let us know where we are) into two or three rapid cuts with some electronic "whoosh" for each one. Pretentious and irritating after the first dozen or so.

I caught the first two hours of this adaptation of Dickens Bleak House on Masterpiece Theatre on Sunday night and I was immediately hooked. If you love dark Victorian mysteries this is a must see. I remember hearing promos for the show stating its starring Gillian Anderson but I thought it was some English actress with the same name as Scully from the X-files. What a shock when I realized I watched Scully for I did not realize it at the time it was her. Ms. Anderson becomes Lady Dedlock replacing her FBI professional pant suits outfits for a Victorian frock. Although common elements to both characters are repressed emotions and icy personalities. I have not read the novel but the show is emphasizing the mystery aspects of the story with Lady Dedlock trying to hide a secret from her past, how everybody's fate is somehow bound into the Jarndyce case over disputed wills and what role if any Esther plays in all of this. Also, the series focuses a sharp eye on the byzantine legal world of Victorian England that makes the US legal system seem the epitome of efficiency. Charles Dance is great as the ruthless barrister Tulkinghorn who sets his sights on uncovering Lady Dedlock's secret. Anne Maxwell Martin is great as the innocent and virtuous Esther Summerson. Besides Ms. Anderson some might recognize Mr. Dance who has seen roles in various movies and TV series including the villain in the Eddie Murphy Buddhist action-adventure movie The Golden Child, and Denis Lawson, who plays the benevolent John Jarndyce, was Wedge Antilles in the original Star Wars movies. Like any Dickens novel this TV series is filled with interesting often eccentric secondary characters from the young law clerk Mr. Guppy to Miss Flite.

The atmosphere is dark with lots of mist, fog and rain as one would expect in a Victorian novel. You have the contrast of the romantic elegant world of Lady Dedlock's estate and the cozy feeling of Bleak House estate with the grim, mud and muck that the lower classes lived in. The period costumes and sets are top notch. The series for me captures the essence of the Victorian period. Can't wait for the series to play itself out.

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A simply magnificent production of Dickens. Read the Amazon editorial review above, I agree with all of it.

Dickens can be difficult to translate to film. His cartoonish drawings of his characters, both literal and literary, are the stuff of political lampoon. And he IS interested in politics; the politics of class, culture, the legal system, and how his characters are trapped in them, by situation, and by their own human choices. His characters and story lines are so intricate that they must have been manna for the readers of his (no tv, no film) time period, but they can sometimes be dry and dull for a modern audience.

Enter the skillfull writing of THE MASTER ADAPTOR Andrew Davies, and a production that careens and slams prison doors from one story to another, and we are briskly carried along... in this story of secrets, blackmail, and the endless wait for the legal system to do... something... anything.

As with most BBC casting, it is excellent... every single character not only LOOKS as they should, but can really act. Nice to see Gillian Anderson break through and prove that yes, american actresses really CAN run with the best of them, if they get the chance to. Anna Maxwell Martin as our lead protagonist is simply wonderful. She has the kind of looks that we do not get to see in the hollywood casting system. Her character does not rely on her appearance, because she knows she can not, but she becomes so dear to us, we care deeply about her, and her complexity and calm in the midst of chaos reveal her true inner beauty. Through her we see the souls of others as they respond to her.

Dickens is VERY interested in the devastation of the Brittish class system, and the costumes and sets bring this all darkly to life, from the filth and disease of the street urchins, the tattered foppishness of a dance instructor, the soldiers barracks and stark sleeping compartments, to the cluttered new money oppulence of Bleak House and the old dusty money feel of the house of the local aristocracy.

The beginning is slow... neccessary to introduce the whole population of characters, and just when you think the train will never take off, it speeds into overdrive, and you scream with dizzy joy like a roller coaster ride. We get all the benefits of todays cinematic language and style in telling, while losing none of the story and atmosphere. A really masterful, very modern production of an old Dicken's tale.

10 stars!

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The time is the 1840's in Victorian England. The film opens with a court case being heard in what was then known as Chancery. A row of justices are hearing the case of Jarndyce vs. Jarndyce, where an inheritance from several generations ago has the trouble of having several claimants, all of whom may be the correct ones. The case has dragged on for so long that people have committed suicide over the outcome, and others have grown withered and old waiting for a decision. As for the lawyers, they're estastic -each one will be getting paid off first, and the longer they drag it all out, the more they'll get.

The story centers around two young people, Richard Carstone (Partrick Kennedy) and Ada Clare (Carey Mulligan), who are cousins and fellow claimnants to the Jarndyce inheritance. The courts have deemed that they are too young to be on their own, so another relation, John Jarndyce (Denis Lawson) has offered them his guardianship and a home at his estate, Bleak House. As it would not be seemly for Ada to be alone, he has invited another young woman, Esther Somerson (Anna Maxwell Martin) to be her companion, and as we discover, to help him run his house. Bleak House, we discover, is actually quite pleasant, and Mr. Jarndyce is one of those people we like to meet in the real world -he warns both Richard and Ada that to pin their hopes on the endless case is foolishness, and instead do as he did and make their own way in the world. But young Richard, as we see, is feckless and more than a little stupid -he can't turn away his hopes of the money, and so plays at picking a profession whether it is law, or medicine, or anything else that would turn a living. We are also introduced to a friend of Jarndyce's -Mr. Skimpole (Nathaniel Parker) who claims to be 'innocent as a child in all things' and who happily battens off of others, in the most odious fashion.

On a neighboring estate, that of Sir Lester Dedlock (Timothy West) and his wife, Lady Dedlock (Gillian Anderson), there is also interest in the case. They are visited by their lawyer, Mr. Tulkinghorn (Charles Dance), who begins his own hunt when Lady Dedlock faints at the signt of the handwrighting on one of the legal briefs. Immediately, we're curious as to the why and who.

The who is Mr. Nemo (John Lynch), a law writer who makes a scanty living by copying out documents for the lawyers. He's also a sad, beaten man who finds solace only in opium. His neighbor, Miss Flite (Pauline Collins), a distressed gentlewoman, has her caged birds for company as her own claim goes on forever in the chancery courts, with little hope for the future as well. And Mr. Nemo's only friend it seems, is Joe, a young streetsweeper who has a very fateful encounter with Lady Dedlock herself at the end of the first two hour segment.

As we discover, not everyone in this tale will end happily or rich. Money, in some form or another, is the constant worry of this tale, along with a general condemnation of the law profession -one result of Dickens' novel was that it created such an outpouring of anger at the Chancery Courts that the system was finally reformed.

This one is a cold, chilling portrayal of the two extremes of early Victorian England. At one end you have the ease of the Dedlocks, John Jarndyce and Mr. Tulkinghorn. At the other is the grinding poverty of Mr. Nemo, Miss Flyte, and Joe. In between there are the uncertain futures of Ada, Richard and Esther, and indeed most of the characters in the novel. Money, and the lack of it, is one of the major themes of the story, along with family secrets, greed and outright lies.

Some critics state that this was probably Dickens' finest novel. I'm inclined to agree, all of the characters are complex, with their own stories and desires giving them voice and depth. Too, Dickens' own wit and scathing humor is pretty evident in the dialog, and the names of the various characters throughout.

This version comes in at 510 minutes, in a DVD transfer that is quite nearly perfect. The lighting at times is haunting with the use of polarized filters, the sound is crisp, and the acting top notch. Whoever did the casting in this was dead-on in their approach -the most intriguing of the characters, Lady Dedlock and Esther, are perfect. Costuming and set design are perfect for the period. Too, the art directors were careful in not wallowing in the poverty-stricken parts of the story, nor in moralizing, they just show things as they were, and let the audience make up their own mind in what can be right or just.

Another version of this was adapted for PBS/Masterpiece Theatre back in 1985, with Diana Rigg as the cold Lady Dedlock.

DVD extras include: subtitles in English,

This miniseries is one of the reasons why PBS?s Masterpiece Theatre and the BBC remain the gold standard as far as I am concerned. If you are curious about more about this novel or the miniseries, be certain to check out their links on . Highly recommended.

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The one Dickens novel I never read turns up in a brilliant realization from Andrew Davies, with mesmerizing characters and first-rate actors in another BBC success. Gillian Anderson refocuses her considerable acting chops to bring the luckless Lady Dedlock to perfect fruition. The relative scarceness of her scenes, and their critical importance to the story, makes her appearances even more tantalizing. The entire cast once again proves the English theatre tradition thriving, and is directed with consummate skill, and pride of detail. I love the redoubtable Pauline Collins as the quintessential Miss Flite, and Charles Dance is incendiary as the heartless Tulkinghorn. Anna Maxwell Martin (Esther Summerson) is a marvel to watch; she corners a self-assurance most actors only dream of, with ownership of every nuance of face and inflection it's a huge performance of requisite Dickensian depth, perfectly tuned and delivered with the most gifted ease imaginable. It's worth every minute just to watch her copiously in her many scenes. Dickens' many minor characters never fail to justify their presence in his novels, however extravagant, and Bleak House has its profuse share. It's amazing how beguilingly the BBC has forged its remarkable history of mini-series of English literature; I can think of few, if any, failures. Bleak House is, bar none, one of its masterpieces. Nothing prevents an unqualified recommendation for an exquisite film experience more than worthy of the great Dickens.