Customer Reviews

The Mrs. Bradley Mysteries - Death at the Opera / The Rising of the Moon / Laurels Are Poison / The Worsted Viper

5 star:		(15)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

I was going to give this DVD four stars but I enjoyed it enough for five. Sometimes perfection has to give away to pure verve.

Ok, let's get this out of the way-- the extras aren't particularly interesting. Somewhere there is an unwritten rule that DVD's have to have extra features but these are a bit of a snooze.

However, no one needs any other reason to watch this DVD than Diana Rigg's portrayal of Adele Bradley, psychoanalyst and sleuth. The art deco era portrayed here-- 1929 is the date mentioned in the first of the Mrs. Bradley Mysteries (available separately)-- was a tough one for clothes. Horizontal stripes, low waists and severe hats that might have doubled as moderne sculpture are not forgiving of figure flaws, but Ms. Rigg carries them off with aplomb. She is the anti-Jane Marple. Fashonable, wordly, very up to date on all the banned literature. She does not view world as a village in macrocosm, she brings a breath of the world to the narrow confines of a her old finishing school, a suspicious village where a traveling show has ended in murder and a country house where it seems the gardner has the upper hand. One waits for the arched eyebrow, the aside to the audience, the flat out rudeness at times.

And let's not forget her chauffeur, George Moody. He wonders in and out of her room at all hours without raising a lot of eyebrows. In the first of the series on this DVD he gives his all to keep Mrs. Bradley from being discovered at her sleuthing, running interference and bringing her information from the servant's hall.

Don't expect complete authenticity do expect a lot of fun.

These are a series of stories that are part mystery and part "camp". Some of the dialog is tongue-in-cheek and humorous....especially when she turns to the camera in an aside and offers up a usually sarcastic comment about the present company. Very good mysteries if you don't take them too seriously and don't expect them to be a "Poirot" or a "Midsomer". Ex "Mrs Peel" at her best!!

A previous reviewer refers to the choice of Diana Rigg to play Mrs. Adela Bradley as miscasting, due to age and a bizarre reference to Rigg being "overweight." Yeah, Dame Diana Rigg is 65, but that's hardly "elderly" unless one is 12. And if Rigg is "overweight" (which she's not!) then Americans are overweight/obese at a rate much higher than 50-60% that experts currently claim.

The character of Adela Bradley has a married son who is at least 25 (appears in first episdoe to be more in the early 30s range), so I hardly think Adela Bradley would be a 40 year old woman. She's "liberated" for the era, but hardly a flapper. Quite the opposite, as flappers were the 20's version of Jessica Simpson--ditzy airheads who live for the moment.

The writing often isn't very good, I'll agree, but that's not the fault of the actors, who ALL do a superb job conveying the essence of the characters they portray. The Mrs. Bradley Mysteries are fun and funny--great entertainment, with British sensibilities--to THIS American Gen-X'er (lest anyone reading assumes I must be "elderly.') Unfortunately, there won't be more in the future, as the BBC chose not to continue the "series."

Actually, she does this for the series as well as in the part of the sleuth in the individual stories. A couple of reviewers rave and one is rather unpleasantly bilious. Me - I'm rather on the rave end of things. Well, well - there's no accounting for taste. The stories are not exactly sublime [certainly not Dorothy L. Sayers, not even Madame Christie], though this may be a comment on the translation to screen: I haven't read the actual books. Neither are they terrible. [And one reviewer's comment about improbability is simply not on: I had an experience of 4 people finding themselves in the same spot half-way round the world without prior knowledge that the others would be there, so truth is at least as strange as the reviled fiction.] What is fairly certain, at least to the majority of the reviewers thus far, is that Diana Rigg indeed saves the day. She's marvelous and a delight and I love every comment she doth utter. Whether it's the best thing she's ever done is...well, come on, lads: she was an acclaimed Medea and Clytemnestra, after all, and I wouldn't be surprised if she hasn't dabbled in a spot of Ibsen in her day. But I love the series for her part in it [and for the banter between her and the chaffeur George], and I hope they extend the series. That this is called "set 1" leads me to hope. In short: if you like Diana Rigg, go for it!

Adela Bradley (Diana Rigg) has thoroughly embraced the Jazz Age, she has intruded into male-dominated fields like toxicology, criminology, and that new science of psychology. She has flouted conventions by discarding her corsets ...and a few husbands, is not adverse to speaking her mind in a most unladylike fashion and is altogether too familiar with her chauffeur George.

In this set of four mysteries Adela returns to her alma mater to deliver a speech and stays to solve a murder (DEATH AT THE OPERA), in THE RISING OF THE MOON, Adela and George happen on a traveling circus and soon find themselves embroiled in long buried secrets, unrequited love, blackmail and murder. Adela (and George) take a break to visit an old friend only to find that her home is truly haunted by more than one ghost from the past (LAURELS ARE POISON). The final mystery (THE WORSTED VIPER) in this set finds Adela accompanying George to a seaside village to attend the wedding of George's daughter. While there a mystery from Adela's past returns. Throughout this series Adela finds herself bumping into Police Inspector Christmas (Peter Davison) much to the annoyance of George.

The tone of these mysteries is lighthearted and irreverent. Adela makes caustic asides to the viewer while delightedly defying conventions. The costuming of this series is marvelous, Adela is dressed in a manner designed to be both up-to-date and shocking, completely keeping in with a character who would do this simply because she could. The muscial score is filled with music from the Jazz Age and is a joy in itself. The mysteries themselves are clever, fastpaced, fairly laid out and full of enough twists and turns to keep the viewer guessing to the end.

I highly recommend this series, especially for any fans of THE THIN MAN or the LORD PETER series.

Sure, the novels by Gladys Mitchell are not great as the books by Agatha Christie, but with a great actress like Dame Diana Rigg this episodes are pure fun (especially the last one "The worsted viper"). You will enjoy it!

Diana Rigg must have relished the role of an iconoclastic, Roaring 20's woman renowned as a happenstance crime-solver and sex-manual author. As Adela Bradley and her chauffeur George Moody travel to diverse destinations, they become embroiled in intriguingly convoluted, yet credible circumstances of murder. Though each of the four episodes results in a perfectly served-up solution, mystery lingers as to the nature of the relationship between mistress and driver. Is romance brewing between the two, or is Mrs. Bradley merely stirring the simmering pot of social upheaval? What is the audience to make of her countless coy gestures and pregnant expressions or of George's sparks of jealousy and demonstrations of rapt admiration? The question adds spice to the series' delectable stew of sly cultural commentary and expostulation upon the human enigma, rendering it imminently rewatchable!

I thoroughly enjoyed both Speedy Death and the boxed set of The Mrs. Bradley Mysteries. Dame Diana Rigg is as usual a consummate pro. I only wish that the BBC had continued the series and that there were more episodes to follow.

I also find it interesting why it seems to be necessary to attack the artist personally when asked to review their work.Diana Rigg is still quite a beautiful woman.

Thank God for writers and actors who can address the lives and issues of mature persons. Believe it or not there are people over fifty in Britain, and in America, who's stories are every bit as interesting as those in their twenties.

Any woman who, upon realizing that she's being checked out by the opposite sex, cannot make up her mind as to whether he is "vaguely fascinating or fascinatingly vague" deserves hats-off. I have found the delightful Mrs. Bradley as my favorite amateur sleuth after Ms. Marple and the utterly humorous Hercule Poirot. "The Mrs. Bradley Mysteries" stars the very charming Diana Rigg (of "The Avengers" fame) in the role of Mrs. Bradley, and Neil Dudgeon as her ever-solicitous servant George Moody. A rich divorcée who travels in her own Rolls Royce, writes books about the psychological aspects of crime, and has her own chauffeur as her nemesis.

This second set in the series brings us "Death at the Opera", "The Rising of the Moon", "Laurels are poison" and "The worsted viper". In the first one, Mrs. Bradley goes back to her "finishing school" - "a place where girls go to be finished, literally, if they believe everything they're taught here" to paraphrase Mrs. Bradley's own words. The school's art teacher dies during the rather bore some performance of Gilbert & Sullivan's "The Mikado". A premature diagnosis by the school's Headmaster proposes it to be a heart attack, but the discovery of scratches on the back of the door tell Mrs. Bradley there's foul play involved. She appears to easily go along with the school Headmaster's desire of not calling in the Police until a second death happens. This is where Inspector Henry Christmas makes his entrance into Mrs. Bradley's life and into the series.

The second episode evolves within a community of nomad entertainers - also known as gypsies. A beautiful young woman, who is the target in the knife-throwing act, gets killed...oddly enough, stabbed to death. A call from Inspector Christmas, asking for her notorious psychological advice, interrupts Mrs. Bradley's night on the town. The next morning, she is driven by George to the quintessential English village, where "once the preserves have been preserved, what else is there to do but die of boredom".

In "Laurels are poison", Mrs. Bradley proposes to her chaffeur a visit to a haunted house; which he accepts, on the condition of not having to do the actual haunting. George takes an active part in this and the next episode, when painful memories of his deceased brother really start to "haunt" him. Later his own daughter is in danger for her life during "The worsted viper". This will appeal to mystery fans who are also interested in the occult - luckily the two go together like a horse and carriage. Someone seems to be practicing an old pagan cult that requires a soon to be married virgin to be sacrificed. I must say the ending took me totally by surprise.

I found Mrs. Bradley to be a character with a rare combination of feminine etiquette and male independence. Her downside is her cynicism; however, she is assertive (and almost sensitive sometimes, to the "womanly arts"); yet there is always a man by her side, be it her chauffeur or Inspector Christmas, who seem to be very protective of her. The costumes are excellent. I love Mrs. Bradley's clothes, especially the hats. The DVD includes cast biographies and a virtual tour of the set as a special feature, with details on the settings for the different episodes. The drawings by Edward Gorey for the Mystery! credits are fantastic in their uniqueness, and his ideas have been applied to the decoration of the sets as well.

FOR THE BEGINNERS YOU CAN FIND "MRS BRADLEY MYSTERIES" ON MOST PBS STATIONS. THIS IS A SUPERB WHO DONE IT, WITH HUMOR AND STYLE.

DIANA RIGG IS GORGEOUS AND LOVELY AS EVER. SHE GIVES THE PERFORMANCES OF HER CAREER IN MY OPINION. PREVIOUSLY SHE WAS EMMA PEEL IN THE AVENGERS, BUT NOTHING COMPARES TO "MRS BRADLEY" I EXPLICITLY BOUGHT A DIGITAL VIDEO RECORDER (DVR) TO RECORD ANYTHING I CAN FIND RE: THIS SERIES AND OTHERS LIKE IT.
TO CAP THINGS OFF DIANA LOOKS INTO THE CAMERA AND GIVE'S US THE VIEWER HER WHOLE TAKE ON THE MATTERS AT HAND SHE IS DEALING WITH.

IF I COULD GIVE THIS SIX/6 STARS ****** SIX IT WOULD BE!

KEEP IN MIND IF YOU RECORD ON A DVR, YOU DONT GET THE EXTRAS YOU FIND ON MOST DVD'S...LET THE CLONING BEGIN WITH DIANA RIGG:)
THIS WHOLE ENTIRE SERIES DEMANDS/BEGS TO BE ON DVD WITHOUT DELAY!!!