Customer Reviews

The Charles Dickens Collection, Volume 1 (Oliver Twist / Martin Chuzzlewit / Bleak House / Hard Times / Great Expectations / Our Mutual Friend) (Slim Packaging)

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

The American television network TNT proclaims in its advertisements, "We know drama," but it can't hold a candle to the BBC. Since the sixties, the Beeb has been producing exquisite adaptations of the plays of Shakepeare, Shaw, and Wilde, the novels of Eliot, Austen, and Trollope, and the works of many other treasures of British and Irish literature, not to mention those of other European nations: Ibsen, Checkhov, Dostoeivsky, and so on.

These productions tend to be simple, elegantly-appointed affairs. There's very little flash, and some viewers may be disappointed by their talky, set-bound nature, but they are quite faithful to their sources. Performances are uniformly top-notch, often by the most talented and justly famous of British actors: Ben Kingsley, Anthony Hopkins, Judi Dench, Patrick Stewart, John Hurt, Diana Rigg, Rex Harrison, John Gielgud, Joan Plowright, and many more.

While this series of Dickens adaptations and its parter, Volume 2, do not utilize thespians especially well-known to Americans (though Ian McKellen, Maggie Smith, Bob Hoskins, and Daniel Radcliffe do star in "David Copperfield" on Volume 2), the acting and direction are excellent.

If you love British literature and history, particularly the Victorian period, you will find these DVD sets to be thoroughgoing treats. They will expose you to dramas both familiar and obscure, and they will encourage you to delve more deeply into the delight that is Dickens.

Both 2009 sets use slim rather than standard DVD cases, so they are more compact versions of the sets issued in 2005 and 2006, but their contents are identical. They are highly recommended in either form.

If you like Dickens or are just curious, try these DVD's. They are done as only the Brits can do them with impeccable acting, right-on characterizations, and attention to historical detail. Great entertainment for the whole family and reasonably priced, too. Highest recommendation.

I have been deeply impressed with the quality of BBC films which I purchased last month. Character development is a big plus with me. Although there is a major plot in each of the Dickens stories, there are also numerous sub plots. I have ordered additional works presented by BBC and hae enjoyed them all.

Watch out because the Our Mutual Friend movie only got half way through and then seemed to get stuck and wouldn't go any further. I tried it on 3 different players with the same result.

I thought all the stories were well done and keep close to the literary companions. The only one that had a hard time holding my interest was Hard Times. I also have vol 2 which so far is fantastic.

I have a large collection of BBC dramatizations of classic English literature and was looking forward very much to the Charles Dickens collection, but when watching Great Expectations I found that episodes froze about 1 to 2 hours into the disk on both sides. I had played the disk on a Sony DVD player and tried playing it on our computer DVD drive with the same result. The video itself was great except for the freezing, which forced us to skip 3 episodes.

I ordered a replacement with the same results. I played Our Mutual Friend with the same result on both the DVD player and computer: episodes froze about 1 to 2 hours into the disk. Episodes earlier and later on the disk played without any problem. I was greatly disappointed and returned the collection for a refund--doubly disappointed because I had looked forward to purchasing volume 2 as well.

I'm curious whether anyone else has had a similar problem with BBC double-sided DVDs. I assume there's an incompatibility between the device used to burn the disks and our Sony DVD player and IBM ThinkCentre M51 DVD drive.

Subsequent to writing the preceding review, I bought the prior version of The Charles Dickens Collection, Volume 1, in which each title is packaged in its own slipcase. The DVD's in that version play without freezing. It was a used box set, but I'm happy to have a fully functioning set of the DVD's. I also have Volume 2 in the slimcase packaging, and those DVD's also play without problem.

I see other reviewers have given this set 5 stars. I cannot quite justify 5, overall, which for me, means pretty much everything has to be right. These books on DVDs are fairly true to the Dickens originals. The actors, for the most part, do their jobs well. Of course, Dickens was a genius of a writer, so no complaints with the stories at all. What I found a bit negative, though, are the sets, and at times, the costumes. Even the lighting and cinematography has a rather obvious low budget look about it. Think made-for-TV, then also think low budget, soundstage instead of location, and you will have the idea. These are not bad discs, but just don't expect them to look like Hollywood productions, because they definitely will not. Packaging is nice, with each disc having its own binder.

The disks I did review all worked. Unfortunately, Dickens has to be spread out because going through the full box and all of the films was just a little to dark with their stories. Not horror, but depressing to try and imagine how life was for so many centuries ago.

The BBC produced this series which means that quality is top-notch. I cannot recommend this item! If you are a die-hard literature buff, this is for you. But I think that people who speak American contemporary English will be hard pressed to overcome the old world British English spoken.It is woven into a thick accent of 1700's - 1800's slang, with the nuances of the Englishes' English. By missing those nuances, the flavor of the times and the meanings are missed. The cover of the DVDs claim closed caption, THEY LIED!!!

I liked several of the movies, but was hard to follow one or two. Guess I need to watch them again.