Customer Reviews

Upstairs Downstairs - The Fifth Season [VHS]

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

 

 

I watched this 16 hour-set in a mini-marathon over a four-day period (having seen many episodes of this and the other seasons on a piecemeal basis over the years). By the fifth season, the writers and cast were at their best and truly knew and understood the characters. The writers also seemed to reach the optimal balance between the Upstairs (aristocracy) and Downstairs (servants) characters. These episodes are all superb.

The aftermath of WW1, the Roaring '20s and the stock market crash of 1929 are the great events affecting the characters in this fifth series. If you're a fan of the series, these closing episodes are a must. If you're interested in the early 20th century history, this series realistically shows how some people were affected by the events. And if you just enjoy good drama (i.e., PBS's Masterpiece Theatre), you'll love all five series of Upstairs Downstairs. Highly recommended.

The fifth and final season of UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS picks up just after the First World War. It's the dawn of a new age, the Roaring Twenties. However, despite all the trevails, life continues at good old 165 Eaton Place.

"On with the Dance" - Richard (David Langton) and his new wife Virginia (Hannah Gordon) start thinking about buying a house in London, when lonely James (Simon Williams) suggests that they move back into Eaton Place.

"A Place in the World" - Bored and dissatisfied with his life, James decides to enter politics...with disastrous results. Edward (Christopher Beeny) and Daisy (Jacqueline Tong) reluctantly return to Eaton Place after finding little employment in the 'outside world'...

"Laugh a Little Louder, Please" - Georgina (Lesley-Anne Down) and James decide to throw a lavish fancy dress party for their society friends. Meanwhile, the new governess Miss Treadwell (Shirley Cain) is due to arrive.

"The Joy Ride" - James buys an aeroplane, and Virginia defies her husband in order to join James for a joy-ride across Southwold. But when they are reported missing, Richard and Lady Prudence (Joan Benham) fear the worst...

"Wanted- A Good Home" - William (Jonathan Seely) is packed off to boarding school, and Alice (Anne Yarker) gets a puppy, which soon upsets Miss Treadwell and puts the servants in an awkward position.

"An Old Flame" - James finds himself back in the arms of Lady Diana Newbury (Celia Bannerman) and they decide to spend the weekend at a golfing cottage. Edward fends off the advances of Diana's flirty maid Violet (Georgina Hale).

"Disillusion" - Hudson (Gordon Jackson) has been seen publicly in the company of maid Lily (Karen Dotrice), which threatens his future in the household.

"Such a Lovely Man" - Virginia is enjoying the attentions of the well-known 'safe man' Sir Guy Paynter (Robert Hardy) while Ruby (Jenny Tomasin) decides to get a pen-pal.

"The Nine Days Wonder" - The chaos of the 1926 General Strike severely divides the Bellamy household. James and footman Frederick (Gareth Hunt) decide to take action...

"The Understudy" - The household is expecting several important guests for a dinner party and Hudson suffers a mild heart attack. Tensions soon run riot downstairs when Edward and Frederick fight over who should take the butler position.

"Alberto" - Georgina gets star struck and decides to become a movie actress. However, when James discovers the skimpy costume she's wearing and that her co-star is none other than Frederick, he decides to cut short her ambition. Frederick leaves Eaton Place to become a gigolo for society women.

"Will Ye No Come Back Again" - Richard, James, Georgina and the servants set out for a holiday in the Scottish Highlands, which takes a bit of getting used to...

"Joke Over" - Following a madcap 'scavenger party', Georgina and her mindless society friends decide to take the Bellamy car on a drive in the country, with deadly results...

"Noblesse Oblige" - Georgina falls madly in love with kindly Robert, the Marquis of Stockbridge (Anthony Andrews); whilst Mrs Bridges (Angela Baddeley) brings in a new kitchen-maid, the rude and lazy Mabel (Elaine Donnelly). Ruby goes to work for the social-climbing matron Mrs Waddilove (Joan Sanderson).

"All the King's Horses" - James returns from visting Elizabeth and her husband in America, full of big ideas and big dreams, mostly concerning the Stock Exchange. James recklessly invests all of Rose's (Jean Marsh) money in bad shares, when the crash of the Stock Exchange heralds the beginning of the Depression...

"Whither Shall I Wander?" - Following James's suicide, all of his property is confiscated, and Eaton Place is to be sold off to pay creditors. What will become of Richard, his family and the servants?... Meanwhile, Georgina marries Robert in a lavish ceremony.

Fans of UPSTAIRS DOWNSTAIRS are bound to shed a tear or two when the series reaches its emotional conclusion. Again, fabulous direction and scripts, as well as top-drawer performances from Angela Baddeley, Gordon Jackson, Jean Marsh and Simon Williams.

Also featuring Michael Logan, Ann Mitchell, Jay Neill, Jack LeWhite, Derek Martin, Una Brandon-Jones, Brian Nolan, Osmund Bullock, Trevor Ray, Ursula Howells, John Quayle, Madeleine Cannon, Raymond Huntley, Marsha Fitzalan, Julia Schofield, Victor Langley, Nicholas Hunter, Peter Forest, Tracey Childs, Tom Chatto, Mike McKenzie, John Caesar, Polly Adams, John Normington, Leonard Kavanagh, Stephen Ismay, Martin Wimbush, Tommy Wright, John Breslin, Roy Pattison, Anthony Woodruff, Andre Charisse, Barbara Bolton, Natalie Caron, Philip Webb, Lorna Kilner, Roy Knight, David Nicoll, Seymour Green, Rowland Davies, Jack Watson, Georgine Anderson, Kenneth Ward, Nigel Havers, Patsy Blower, Terence Bayler, Barry Stanton, Bernard Barnsley, Robert Hartley, Daphne Lawson, Kenneth Thornett, Sue Crossland, Deddie Davies, Frank Duncan, Pippa Page and Lindsay Campbell.

4 single-sided, dual-layer discs.

I enjoyed the Final season, but I didn't care for it as much as the previous four seasons. Season Five, felt almost as though the writers knew the series was ending and they didn't need to 'try' so hard to pull it off. Several characters change radically: Daisy becomes a nagging shrew, and kitchenmaid Ruby shows a 'spark' of the original character design in that she is a bit 'larcenous,' (claiming in the end, that she planned to outlive Mr. Hudson and Mrs. Bridges and inherit the business).

Favorite episode was: "Will they no come back again?" where the staff and master James and the rest go to Scotland for vacation. Hudson manages to handle things with his usual aplomb and dignity, and the staff are forced to confront a mysterious 'ghost.'

The ending, I felt was sad and almost 'tacked on.' I would've liked a more 'happier ending' than the one which was given. Overall, while I enjoyed season five, it lacked the vitality and hopefullness of season four.... And, at least for me, has far less 'rewatch-ability.'

When television was reaching for the stars this series which lasted 5 years was like a rocketship in the anals of entertainment. Thirty years later it is still totally absorbing, sophisticated, and fun to watch. It is a classic that my husband and I re-visited recently over a period of several months. If you missed Upstairs Downstairs in the '70's don't miss it now if you can help it. A combination of a British soap opera, classical drama and comedy, we got totally involved in the family upstairs, and the second family of servants, downstairs. It's a hoot.

The fifth season of Upstairs Downstairs runs from 1919 to 1930. It is my least favorite series, because 165 Eaton Place just doesn't seem to belong in the Roaring Twenties. Even so, there are some fine moments, but there is a pathos over the whole series. Its like everyone in the cast and crew knew this was going to be the last series and everyone was a bit depressed. Georgina is not very convincing as a flapper, especially when you realize that she'd be in her mid thirties by the time she finally gets married and settles down. The best caste members are Virginia, Lady Bellamy and incorrigible old James, who is as irresponsible as ever. The series ends with the onset of the Great Depression, and the final scenes, as Rose walks through the empty rooms, are unbearably sad.

One cannot review one season without thinking about the preceding seasons. This wonderful series presents a life completely unlike my own and yet it is "real". The series as a whole is a small look at history through the eyes of those living it, fom the major to the mundane; the sinking of the Titanic,Englands participation in WWI, political happenings, dinner parties,are seen through the eyes of the servants and the "upper crust." .

The fifth season brought the series to a close by presenting the truth that time changes our lives--in both small and large ways.

The last season of Upstairs, Downstairs is probably the best one of all. The audience is in the Roaring 20s, with Richard Bellamy married to his kind and intelligent second wife. The most poignant episodes are those in which James Bellamy confesses to Georgina that he loves her. She returns his feelings but does not wish to marry him. There is happiness when James comes back from America a rich man and tragedy when he loses it all because of the Market Crash. The ending is beautifully done, with Georgina's wedding to a future Duke. Rose going through the house just before its new owners take over adds a dramatic touch. We are there with them for the final goodbye.Different Flags Impeccable. Eugenia Renskoff

Unfortunately Amazon sent us 2 seasons 4, instead of the seasons 4 and 5. Do not know how to contact Amazon on this problem so guess cannot review the product, but will sit here and pout instead.

Although many of my friends were enthralled with this series when it was first on TV, I never managed to watch it. For one thing I was busy going to nursing school, graduate school in history and working full time. For another I wasn't sure I was up to what I suspected would be melodrama of the highest order. I resent having my feelings manipulated until I feel like I'm on a emotional roller coaster. After working almost 2 decades in intensive care, I've seen enough of human grief to last more than one lifetime; I don't require my entertainment to give me an emotional workout. I like happy endings to my fiction.

Recently however, I've been on a period setting murder mystery binge and had run out of them. After watching the same set of DVDs--most of them by the BBC in combination with American public television--two or three times, I decided it might be time to branch out and see what else these producers of master works had to offer. That's when I came upon the Upstairs Downstairs series again and decided to give it a try.

I started with the fifth season intentionally, because I felt that if it was going to be a sappy series it would definitely be by then! I was really pleasantly surprised. The characters are all charming. While the stories are poignant, they are also plausible and restrained. They make their point without emotionally bludgeoning the viewer. These are simple stories of nice people living their lives as people do, with ups and downs, drawing on their human connections for advice and strength. They are people one might well know. Even collateral characters, like those at the political meetings, are real and sympathetic.

This particular collection is particularly pertinent to our own times, since it deals with the issues of soldiers returning from war to find that everything and nothing has changed. Without jobs, families are in desperate straits. The former camaraderie between the wealthy and middle classes and the working poor fostered by shared experiences on the battle front seems to have melted away. Promises of a better future made during extreme times have been forgotten and those to whom the promises were made feel betrayed and angry; trust has been lost and worse yet hope.

A wonderful series and one I expect to see more of.

Upstairs and Downstairs established the Program Masterpiece Theater on PBS, one of the longest running shows on this network. This last Season wraps up very nicely the whole series. Great and addictive veiwing.