Customer Reviews

The Day of the Triffids

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(4)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

NOTE: As I own the 2/4 region version of this film, my review deals with the substance of the story (NO spoilers!). I have preordered a copy coming from Amazon and will update my review immediately after receiving that one.

This is a six part mini-series based on the book by John Wyndham, first broadcast in the UK in 1981 and subsequently shown on PBS (where I first saw it). The Day of the Triffids is quite the father to "28 Days Later", in that it is an end-of-the world-as-we-know-it tale, but it has a good deal less gore and offers up a romance between the leads John Duttine (as Bill Masen) and Emma Relph (as Josella Payton).

The plot centers on two main elements: the introduction of a complex, new form of plant life that provides a highly profitable type of oil and the appearance of a massive meteor shower that is eagerly viewed by most of the inhabitants of the world.

As this is a BBC television production, the sense of a play unfolding and the accents of some of the characters may not appeal to some American viewers. Yet, the dialogue is crisp and the emotional interplay very human in a situation where the world seems to have gone mad. The special effects are minimal but fairly convincing (remember this was made over 25 years ago).

This is one of my favourite science-fiction movies of all time. The actors do a very solid job of bringing the characters to life, there is a very real feeling of dread as the veiled nature of the triffids becomes apparent and the responses of various peoples to the crisis rings true throughout.

It should be noted that an earlier effort at adapting the book for film starred Howard Keel (many will have seen this courtesy late night movies). That version ended up quite a mishmash and strayed very far from the source material - I would assign it just two stars.

I highly recommend The Day of the Triifids done by the BBC.

NOTE: Received the Region 1 version from Amazon. It is a near exact copy of the other; again highly recommend this disc!

As Wyndham Meant It
I have a soft spot in my heart for the movie starring Howard Keel but it was not very true to the book. This mini-series is much truer. The first obvious difference is that the Triffids are already around and farmed as a cash crop. While true to the book the pacing is changed so that cliffhangers and other tense moments fall right at the end of each episode but none of these changes affect the feel.
Howard Keel starred in a movie where the main point was fighting the Triffids. It was man versus monster. This version is much less about fighting Triffids and much more about humanity learning to deal with having been temporarily knocked down a peg (after all, newborns will not be born blind). It is about planning for a rough couple of decades and not the end of the world. The acting is decent and the few necessary special effects are well handled. When it was all over I really felt like I had just watched Wyndham's classic. Check it out.

THIS [THE ORIGINAL BBC VERSION] IS FAITHFUL TO JOHN WYNDHAMS BOOK. I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR OVER 20 YEARS TO GET A PROFESSIONAL COPY OF IT. WHEN I FIRST SAW IT IN 1985, I MADE A VHS COPY WHICH I WORE OUT IN 10 YEARS! I WISH THAT THEY HAD REMASTERED THE SOUND [DOLBY DIGITAL] AS WELL AS THE PICTURE. IT'S APPROACH [LIKE MOST MOVIES FROM THE UK] IS RELATIVELY LOW KEY [IT'S NOT A SHOOT EM UP!]. IF YOU'VE SEEN THIS PRESENTATION BEFORE, GET IT FOR YOUR LIBRARY. IT'S HEAD & SHOULDERS ABOVE THE 1962 MOVIE BEARING THE SAME NAME. YOU WON'T BE DISAPPOINTED!

Yes, I know. A version of this movie was done with American actor Howard Keel, and that's the popular version. Yes, sci-fi, horror, flesh eating plants don't sell as well as they used to. But this is really one of the best, and certainly it's the best version of this story and stays closest to the book.
Do we Americans ALWAYS have to buy multiregion players in order to get all the good British programming? (rant off, I apologize.)

As I mentioned above, this is a true-to -the book mini-series . The book was written by the same person who wrote the story that Village of the Damned was taken from. It is scary without being ridiculous, and it has surprisingly good acting by the leads.
Any Americans able to play this format should pick this disc up.

I was delighted to see that this British mini-series adaptation of John Wyndham's sf novel "Day of the Triffids" will now be available on American DVD. I had a copy on VHS which I had taped when the series had been shown on my local PBS station, but I made the mistake of loaning it to a couple of idiots who somehow managed to break it. (How do you break a videotape, I'd like to know?)

In Wyndham's novel, a strange world-wide disaster leaves mankind vulnerable to the triffids, a species of mobile plants whose origins are unknown. The story follows one man (played by John Duttine, star of another popular British series "To Serve Then All My Days") who by chance was unaffected by the disaster and his travels around England, trying to find others like himself and re-establish civilization. It adheres very closely to the novel and the writing and acting are up to the usual high British standards. Much better than the earlier American version with its ridiculous "Wizard of OZ" ending. (I like Howard Keel, but he should stick to musicals.)

Highly recommended.

The reviews so far seem to be of two different camps - fans who fondly remember the BBC series from the 1980's and non-fans who jeer at the dated production values. This version of day of the Triffids holds up well over 25 years after it was first broadcast - especially compared to other TV series of the same era. I am specifically thinking about the Louis Jourdan version of Dracula which I fondly remembered but now seemed hokey with lame psychedelic effects. But Triffids is still very effective and thought provoking, it is well acted (especially John Duttine as Bill Masen) and the Triffid plants seem plausible (though I think they move a little to fast). But this series is not a $100 million blockbuster, so if that what you are expecting, avoid this DVD. This TV version is far superior to the 1962 movie.

This version is far superior to the 1962 version. The scenes in which the triffids first reveal themselves is chilling. The long length gives the viewer a chance to really understand what John Wyndham had in mind when he wrote the book.
My only problem with this DVD is there are no extras. DVD's were practically made for pouring on the extras. This one, however, has nothing, which is a real dissapointment.

Like many Americans, I first saw this miniseries when it was broadcast on PBS in the 1980s. When it came out on DVD, I knew I had to get a copy of it for my collection. This is a superb adaptation of John Wyndham's classic novel, one that updated the setting while retaining the essentials of the book. Though not a big-budget adaptation, it succeeds brilliantly in creating a powerful atmosphere through excellent acting, a haunting score, and stark images of the virtually empty streets of London. There is no sense of coziness in this catastrophe, just fear followed by the collapse of civilization and the grim struggle for survival that follows. All of it makes for compelling viewing, entertainment well worth the price of the DVD.

"The Day of the Triffids" television series renders faithfully John Wyndham's 1951 novel that established his name as a writer of science fiction. Six, 30-minute episodes tell the story of Bill Masen, a "Triffid" farmer surviving in a post-apocolyptic world where the vast majority of the population has been suddenly stricken blind by a spectacularly brilliant meteor shower. Because he was recovering from eye surgery and his eyes were bandaged, Bill' sight is spared -- an interesting twist. Spared also is Jo Payton, a party girl Bill meets along the way who was nursing a hangover during the celestial event. There are others, too, who for one reason or another missed the event and still have their sight. But they are in the minority.

Add to the mix the Triffids -- gigantic, carnivorous plants able to uproot themselves and move about, fell a man with a single sting then wait until the remains decompose to a state the Triffid's root system can absorb. The Triffids were farmed in electified containments, harvested for a precious oil they produce. But now the monsters are out of the box.

If society is to survive, the sighted must take charge. Those vying to lead mankind out of the darkness offer a variety of approaches, some with questionable motives.

Fans of the 1962 theatrical film of the same name will be disappointed at the lack of glitzy special effects and horrifying encounters between Triffids and their blind, helpless prey. Fans of the novel, however, will appreciate the focus on ethical and moral dilemas presented by the events as they arise, and that typify Wyndham's writings.

At its core, "The Day of the Triffids" is a lesson in situation ethics, here subdued but terrifying nonetheless. I recommend it to fans of the original author and serious consumers of the genre.

Wednesday May 12th 1982: Agriculturalist, Bill Masen, awakens in a London hospital to discover that he has miraculously missed the end of the world. Unbeknownst to Bill, whose eyes have been swathed in bandages for ten days following some emergency ocular surgery, the majority of the population of the planet has been blinded following a unique cosmic event. Staggering through the streets of an eerily silent London trying to make sense of it all, Bill begins to become very nervous indeed when he realizes that the balance of power between man and Triffid - large, genetically engineered, carnivorous, mobile plants farmed en masse for their high grade oil and possessed of poisonous whip-like stings - has been changed irrevocably and in the days that follow, Bill will realize just how fragile man's dominance of the planet really was...

In direct opposition to the awful sixties big screen version starring Howard Keel, The BBC's six part adaptation of John Wyndham's classic dystopian sci-fi novel, "Day Of The Triffids" is as faithful an adaptation of a literary classic as you're ever likely to see. Originally broadcast in the fall of 1981, it made an indelible impression on my burgeoning young mind and remains a bleak, brutal television classic nearly thirty years later. An obvious influence on Danny Boyle's "28 Days Later", Douglas Livingstone's script manages to retain all the intelligence, bleakness, humanity and humour of Wyndham's novel whilst contemporizing the setting and Ken Hannam's evocative direction favours the 'less is more' approach - a wise move considering the budgetary constraints he was clearly working against (this was a television series shot on video tape, with filmed inserts, by the BBC in 1981, after all). The title sequence, featuring a montage of green-lit faces gazing up at the heavens and being assailed by Triffid whips to the accompaniment of Christopher Gunning's ominous choral arrangements, remains one of the most memorably sinister to ever grace a television program.

John Duttine (later the star of the offbeat BBC sitcom, "Lame Ducks") delivers an excellent performance as an everyman thrust into an unthinkable situation and is ably supported by Emma Relph's reluctant heroine and Maurice Colbourne's ambiguously ruthless anti-hero; though it has to be said, the real stars of the the piece are the Triffids themselves which, though they may look rather clunky in these days of slick CGI, are realized using some nicely squishy plant props and an ominous sound design (the sound of the monstrous vegetables rattling their leg-like stumps against their knotty boles has haunted me for some twenty eight years).

Recently watching the entire three hour series in it's entirety again with my partner, who hadn't even been conceived when it was originally broadcast, we were both struck by how well it stands up as a piece of drama today. In her own words, "it's better than most of the shows on TV today". High praise indeed and a judgment I wholeheartedly endorse.

If you like what you see here, I also recommend that you check out the original 1975 incarnation of the post-apocalyptic plague drama, "Survivors"(although don't bother with the sanitised, PC remake as its terrible), as well as the spooky sci-fi murder mystery, "The Nightmare Man", and that classic of hydrophobic paranoia, "The Mad Death", which were all made by the BBC, back in the days when the television licence fee was actually spent on worthwhile programming.