@BlueHammer85 - West Wing only in at 60?
The Sweeney Brass Eye I, Claudius The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin West Wing Grange Hill Dr Who The Bridge Shameless The Thick Of It Love/Hate Vikings Seinfield Red Riding Blue Planet The Americans NYPD Blues Happy Valley ER Steptoe and Son Bottom Dads Army The Office (USA) Justified //24 Frasier Inside No.9 Deadwood World War 2 in colour Dexter Lost The Larry Sanders Show Friends Mindhunter Our Friends In The North Wolf Hall World In Action The Wonder Years Sons Of Anarchy The X Files Sherlock Holmes Succession Rick And Morty Luther Rome
All the cunts who hang out in the Politics subforum would do well to watch Brass Eye.
It’s basically Chris Morris telling you to go and fuck yourselves.
Great post from Lovebites about I Claudius too.
I watched it when I was eighteen and read the books around the same time. It really cemented an interest in Rome and Romans that has lived with me to this day. I haven’t watched it since but it is seared into the memory. I put it no 7 on my list and it would probably have been higher if I had watched it recently. I recognise everything you say about the budget, in fact Up Pompeii looked like a Ridley Scott epic in comparison. But the story, the writing and above all the cast and acting will seldom if ever be bettered. We have dumbed down TV considerably since.This is tending to become very much a poll on fictional series only. Understandable, but I thought it was a bit broader than that.
That said: a comment about I Claudius, which was my no. 1. I was riveted by it all those years ago. Bought it about ten or fifteen years ago on DVD. Still gripped.
The thing is, you can see it's been made with a bag of crisps and a packet of Smarties — the budget must have been laughable. The sets are a joke, the music (such as it is) is confined to heralds playing the same pre-recorded bit which sounds like a cow in labour. The costumes are the kind of thing you might get for Christmas when you were ten (if you were lucky).
Everything — everything — rests on the screenplay, which is brilliant, and the quality of the acting. Brian Blessed, Siân Philips, John Hurt, Derek Jacobi (in the performance of a lifetime), George Baker as a wonderfully creepy Tiberius. Oh — nearly forgetting Patrick Stewart. A small oversight. Just a phenomenal team performance, with two bits of wood and some papier maché as back up.
I can understand a) that a lot of people on here would not have seen it first time round, and therefore never, and that b) in the wake of the epics revival with things like Rome and Gladiator, with all the sophistication that implies, people might not be able to get past the visual hokeyness of it. I lent the DVDs to a much younger friend a few years back — somebody who appreciates good acting — and he just couldn't get past that. I am, though, rather disappointed that it's placed relatively low. I didn't much care about any of my other choices. But that one, I did.
The West Wing and The Sweeney were both in my 20.
My Dad, who sadly died much too young in 1979, and I used to watch The Sweeney together on a Monday night whilst my Mum was out at night school (she taught a class once a week); it was our show so had to make the cut. It was also groundbreaking TV.
You can watch the Sweeney on youtube ....still brilliantNever saw a lot of it, but I had friends who raved. It was a tough cop show, which showed the Old Bill warts and all, was it not?
Mind you, there's groundbreaking for every generation. I well remember when Z Cars broke on our screens. Up to then, we'd had No Hiding Place and Dixon of Dock Green!
Never saw a lot of it, but I had friends who raved. It was a tough cop show, which showed the Old Bill warts and all, was it not?
Mind you, there's groundbreaking for every generation. I well remember when Z Cars broke on our screens. Up to then, we'd had No Hiding Place and Dixon of Dock Green!