Customer Reviews

Sharpe's Company

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Sharpe and his men are fighting not only the French in this tale but an evil and devious sergeant as well who has some history with Sharpe.

The battle and action scenes are top notch again and the characters are grand and heroic. The settings and costumes make it all very colorful and real.

The actors again do a great job with Sean Bean, Asumpta Serna and Daragh O'Malley giving us wonderful heroic performances. Special mention has to go to Pete Postlethwaite who delivers a scenery chewing performance as the evil Sergeant Hakeswill. Marvelous!

I enjoyed this one and have no complaints at all about the quality of the DVD picture or sound.

Whatever my record was for urging one character to kill another in a movie, I surely broke it while watching "Sharpe's Company." This is the third film in the series based on the novels of Bernard Cornwell and is set in Spain in 1812 as the Duke of Wellington begins his invasion of Spain from Portugal while Napoleon is preoccupied with developments in northern Europe. The key to a successful campaign is the capture of two great fortresses, Ciudad Rodrigo in the north and Badajoz in the south. Meanwhile, Richard Sharpe (Sean Bean) has his own concerns.

First, Sharpe is demoted to lieutenant, when the captancy of his unit is purchased a nobleman. That means are hero longs to do something that will get his rank back so that he cannot lose it again, and being the first into the breach when a fort is stormed would be the way of doing it. Second, he learns the his lover, the Spanish rebel Teresa (Assumpta Serna), has given birth to their daughter (which suggests a really big gap of well over a year between the second and third movies). She goes back behind enemy lines to continue her part of the war and ends up in the fort that the British will be attacking in the climax of the movie.

But Sharpe is not the most compelling character in this story. That would be Sergeant Obadiah Hakeswill (Pete Postlethwaite), who once had Sharpe flogged for something he did not do. Hakeswill is the villain of this piece and it is not long after he shows up that you start urging Sharpe, Sergeant Harper (Daragh O'Malley) or any one of the riflemen to kill this guy. Because he survived a battle Hakeswill believes he is invincible and this guy is a sadistic loon; I lean towards him being more sadistic than insane, but there is strong evidence either way. This guy talks to his mother in his hat and never takes the direct route to hurt someone, which he manages to do quite often.

We have a new actor playing Wellington at this point (Hugh Fraser) and a new spy master, Major Nairn (Michael Byrne), to complicate Sharpe's life. But the character that I liked was the new colonel of the regiment, who has a touch of the upper class twit to him, especially when it comes to speaking the King's English, but who knows enough about men and soldiering not to completely botch things. This is a man who will apologize to a common soldier when warranted without batting an eye. Now if he would just have Obadiah Hakeswill shot on sight I would be a much happier person.

The attack on Badajoz is a well-staged battle sequences, especially given the limitations of the production in terms of men and material. Sharpe's reason for leading his men in the attack is probably not one that we have heard before, but strikes me as a better reason to face death than we usually hear in such stories. But there is no doubt that what you are going to remember at the end of "Sharpe's Company" is Postlethwaite's performance and since the fourth movie is called "Sharpe's Enemy" there is little doubt as to who is the title character and the only concern is how much damage he will do to Sharpe's friends and family before he meets his just dessert.

I found the first three Shape's adventures to be wonderfully entertaining. My wife and I enjoyed them together. We were both wondering why this is considered the third episode when it should be the fourth - and there is no third. Somehow between Sharp's Eagle and Sharpe's Company our hero is married and has a child. There are glimpses of a wedding - and a duel - at the beginning of the episode but that is all there is: glimpses. But the individual episodes - though better viewed as a series - do stand alone and you can fill in what seems to be missing.

This episode brings Pete Postlethwaite as Sergeant Hakeswill into the series. He is flat out evil and certainly mad. Pete Postlethwaite is a first rate actor so it's interesting to see him in such an over-the-top role. I'm sure he loved it.

The English troops are storming a fortress. After blasting a breach in the wall they are cut down like stalks of wheat until Sharpe and his men take charge. Sharpe is anxious to get inside as his wife and the daughter he has never seen are inside and he knows the English soldiers will rape and pillage once victorious. Sure enough, the guys you were just rooting for now deserve to be swinging from a tree limb. And Sergeant Hawkswill shows up with designs on Sharp's wife.

I have noticed the scripts are not by the same writer so I am quite sure I will run into a clunker or two in the remaining shows in the series, but the first three were all great and as a whole I am equally sure this is going to be a fine series.

Whoa! What's going on? Have all these reviews been written by the publishers marketing department?

These are great tv adventures. If you liked the Hornblower series you would like these but................unlike the Hornblower series these are poorly transferred, little better than below average VHS. A great shame.

The British TV adaptation of Bernard Cornwell's beloved Richard Sharpe series started with two exceedingly low-budget, solidly entertaining episodes: "Sharpe's Rifles" and "Sharpe's Eagle." A few dozen actors looked like they were running around the same ten acres of real estate while desperately trying to convey the impression that they were part of the mighty clash between Wellington and Napoleon. Thanks to some great acting and gifted storytelling, the first two episodes worked.

With "Sharpe's Company," the series gets "bigger." The focal point of this episode is the storming of a French-held fortress by British troops, and while the scenes are nowhere close to something Peter Jackson or Steven Spielberg might assemble, it's clear that the producers have given their team more to work with. That's all to the good, as the sight of the British soldiers storming the French fortress is heart-pounding and melancholy at the same time.

Richard Sharpe, for the uninitiated, is gutter trash who has been raised through the ranks to officer status thanks to his bravery and ambition. As Wellington admiringly says, "You're a rogue, Sharpe, but you're my rogue." Still, for most in the the class-conscious British army does not much care for rankers as officers - by definition, Sharpe is not a "gentleman," so he cannot be an excellent officer. Accordingly, Sharpe's brief promotion to captain is superseded when a wealthy family buys the position for their second son, and Sharpe is busted back to Lieutenant. Not content to demote Sharpe, the British army gives Sharpe the unenviable duty of being quartermaster - easily the last place an ambitious man of action such as Sharpe wants to be.

Compounding Sharpe's problems is the fact that he just learned that he has a daughter by the Spanish freedom fighter Teresa. The lovely Teresa is still working as an intelligence officer for Major Hogan, and she is spying in the very French fortress that Sharpe must storm. With his wife and daughter in the very place he is trying to raze to the ground, Sharpe is one grumpy cuss.

And to make matters as bad as possible, Sergeant Obidiah Hakeswill (Pete Postlethwait) returns. Hakeswill was Sharpe's sergeant when Sharpe was a private in the India campaign, and Hakeswill took great delight in tormenting Sharpe, even having Sharpe whipped for one of Hakeswill's crimes. An insane, murdering rapist, Hakeswill nevertheless knows how to play to superior officers to get what he wants done, which makes him a lethal opponent for Sharpe and his 95th Rifles even though Sharpe outranks him.

Postlethwait's arrival is fortunate, for this wonderful actor has a field day with the twitchy Hakeswill. Postlethwait's presence makes the absence of Brian Cox as Major Hogan much less noticeable, even if it remains regretable.

Ultimately, Sharpe finds himself battling Hakeswill and the French as he takes charge of the force invading the French fortress. Unlike "Sharpe's Rifles" and "Sharpe's Eagle," which focused quite a bit on the glorious side of battle, "Sharpe's Company" spends a lot of time focusing on the human cost of war as many good young British soldiers are lost in the horrific fighting.

An entertaining adaptation of Bernard Cornwell's novel, "Sharpe's Company" shows that the fans of the Richard Sharpe series have given their devotion to a crack bunch of filmmakers. Enjoy.

An excellent portrait of the Napoleon wars. Reminds me of "Gettysburg" and "Rough Riders" only more earthy and with less hero worship of the characters. Sean Bean is excellent as Sharpe. The antagonist (A Sergeant who's name escapes me) is so well and despicably played that you love to hate him. He is really a scoundrel. I immediately became interested in reading the series. Well worth an evening's investment. END

I really enjoy the Richard Sharpe series and decided to get one of the DVDs of his adventures. Having read the book it was easy to follow except I have a little trouble understanding the British accent at times during the movie.

Since I'm reading Sharpe's Eagle, allow me to skip the novel's film adaptation-the second in the Sharpe series-and continue with the third installment, Sharpe's Company. Sean Bean returns in this 1994 telefilm as Richard Sharpe, a Captain raised from the ranks by Wellington during the Napoleonic Wars.

Sharpe's Company opens with Sharpe being demoted to a menial Lieutenant after lesser men have bought commissions above him. Separated from Sergeant Harper (Daragh O'Malley) and the rest of the Chosen Men of the 95th Rifles, Sharpe faces off against an enemy from his past, Sergeant Obadiah Hakeswill (Pete Postlethwaite). Hakeswill is a rapist and a thief who was hanged once before, but did not die. Sharpe was flogged because of him, and Hakeswill vows to claim Sharpe's lover Teresa (Assumpta Serna) for his own. Sharpe can only reclaim his promotion on the battlefield, and he must claim victory to save Teresa and their daughter Antonia from the vile Hakeswill.

The regular cast in Sharpe's Company has grown into their characters just fine. Serna is again lovely as the guerilla leader Teresa Moreno. Daragh O'Malley is perfect as the ever faithful Harper, but newcomer Pete Postlethwaite steals the show as the sleezy Sergeant Hakeswill. His look, the twitches, his dialogue sells every creepy thing about his character. As much as we love Sharpe for Sharpe, you really want him to get his vengeance on Hakeswill because you can't stand the slime.

Kudos also to the titular Sean Bean. Sharpe's Company isn't meant to be too deep or serious, but Bean gives another dimension to Sharpe here. He wants to save the daughter he's never seen, but he's also willing to die for his King. I have to admit; sometimes I can't keep track of who all the new boys are as they come and go. It's like the red shirts in Star Trek. When a new Lieutenant or Captain makes his appearance-whether he hates Sharpe of befriends him-he usually ends up dead.

These passing characters coming or going from author Bernard Cornwell's canon don't deter from the story in Sharpe's Company. In fact, Company is one of the better episodes in the series. Big historical battles are fully explained and in the proper context here, in the midst of Sharpe's personal dilemmas. His family, his vengeance, his zest for promotion and the conflicts with superiors who are all show-Sharpe's Company twists all these together in a pretty end. And just think-there's plenty more Sharpe to be had in the next film, Sharpe's Enemy.

Director Tom Clegg and his production team get the battle sequences down pat for Sharpe's Company. Despite all the nighttime action, things are well lit, choreographed and edited properly- you know what the heck is going on without being a Napoleonic historian. The hit and miss electric guitar music is still there, but the rousing score during the battle of Badajoz adds to the valiance onscreen.

It's not a big deal, but the credits and the look of the series is slightly better in Sharpe's Company than previous episodes. It's not explained which is understandable. The cast is another year older and all, but the little changes in titles, score, and cast continue throughout the series. This is where some behind the scenes features would be really wonderful, but alas again there are no extras or subtitles. The digital transfer is also imperfect, but should these nitpicks turn one away from Sharpe? Surely not.

Sharpe's Company is one of the highlights on the series. Depth and villainy beyond Napoleon are introduced. The epic is there as well as the personal. You need not see Sharpe's Eagle to enjoy Company, but after this one, how could you not want to see Sharpe's Enemy?

Check your online retailer for Sharpe dvds-individually or as a box set. Kids might shy from the romancey aspects, but there's enough story and action for the boys. Young and old viewers can enjoy Sharpe's Company.

I am generally not as enthusiastic about the Sharpe DVD's as I am about the books, however, this one is an all-around MUST SEE! In particular, Sgt. Hakeswill is portrayed so well, you will want to attack your screen!

Another DVD in the series. Great. Can not wait for more. If you like any of the series you will like this one also.war