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Having loved all the books by Rosamunde Pilcher, I was at first a little reluctant to get hold of the film versions of her saga novels. I felt that they would inevitably be disappointing. However, tempted by positive reviews, I finally put them on my wishlist. I was pleased to receive 'Coming Home' for my birthday.
This is a made-for-TV adaptation of Pilcher’s wartime novel 'Coming Home'. As such, it was longer than most films. It is on two DVDs of about 100 minutes each.
Admittedly it's a few years since I read the book. But I thought it was a very good adaptation, on the whole. There were some minor character changes, and alterations to the plot which I was aware of. But the bulk of it seemed to me to be pretty close to the book.
The actors were excellent. Joanna Lumley brings the materialistic (but caring) Diana Carey-Lewis to life, and Emily Mortimer is a most believable Judith. She is the main character, aged 14 at the start of the book. She is sent to boarding school while her parents and little sister return to a job abroad.
Like the book, this film is very emotional in places, and gripping throughout. There are some surprising nudity shots and non-explicit love scenes, which I suppose is why the UK rating is 12. Oddly enough, it is not rated at all in the USA.
Ardent fans of Pilcher's books might object to the changes made to this version. But I would recommend it in general to those who have not read the book as well as to those who have.
Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews
I had never heard of the film 'Enchanted'. But then I really don't keep abreast of available movies, and am not particularly keen on Disney anyway. Still, the blurb on the back made it sound like an interesting, light movie to watch with relatives who had it on their shelves. It was clearly very highly rated by many.
It's supposed to be a humorous spoof on Disney films in general. There is a princess who is banished from a fairytale land by an evil queen. She is sent to the 'real' world, where she meets and falls for a handsome lawyer. Strange things ensue as the cultures collide...
Unfortunately, we couldn't really understand why this film is considered so good. The storyline was remarkably complicated - or perhaps I was too simple to understand it - and the songs, we thought, were very poor. We all struggled to find anything remotely amusing in it, until there was one funny line. But, alas, I have now forgotten it. Most of the film consisted of bad attempts at humour that fell pretty flat.
Having said that, there was nothing BAD about it, other than some unexpected swear words here and there. But we couldn't find anything good either. I kept drifting off to sleep as I was so bored.
I really wouldn't recommended this, and don't plan to acquire it for our collection. But then again, this film has plenty of fans. So feel free to disagree with me.
Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews
I have so enjoyed re-watching Quantum Leap. It was the only TV programme I used to watch when we lived in America in the early 1990s. Finding the entire series available on DVD was a wonderful surprise, and we've gradually been watching them all.
Season 3 was a Christmas present at the end of 2007. This was excellent timing as we were approaching the end of series 2. We've watched the 22 episodes of this season in just four months, which is a tribute to how much we have enjoyed them.
I don't, in general, watch television at all, or more than about two DVDs per month. But somehow, in this series, Sam and Al - brilliantly played, as ever, by Scott Bakula and Dean Stockwell, respectively - begin to feel more like friends as we get to know both of them rather better.
This season begins with the moving and thought-provoking two-part story called 'The Leap Home'. We meet some of Sam's family as he leaps back into his own history. He first tries to help his high school basketball team, and then to see his brother in the war with Vietnam. Sam has to make some difficult decisions, and we learn quite a bit about his past.
In other episodes, Sam becomes a priest, a beauty queen, a motorcycle rebel, a pregnant teenager... and much more. There's a rather predictable Christmas episode that's very fluffy, and at the other extreme, an episode where Sam is a convicted man on 'Death Row'.
Inevitably some are more amusing than others - often depending on the banter between Sam and Al - and some are quite thought-provoking. There seems to be a wider variety of characters in this season than the previous ones, and Scott Bakula shows how very talented he is, in that they all seem believable.
This series makes more sense if one has seen at least the first series, but it's not necessary to have done so. Nor is it necessary to watch them all in order, although we have enjoyed doing so.
Definitely recommended. Rated 12 in the UK, probably due to some violence and innuendoes, but unrated in the USA.
Links to reviews of the other seasons of Quantum Leap:
Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews
I wasn't entirely sure what to expect with this film. 'Finding Neverland' was highly recommended on Amazon, and also by some friends, so I added it to my wishlist. But for some reason I kept putting off watching it. Maybe the idea of it being a true (or at least based on true) story made me reluctant to see it.
However, we finally decided that it would be good to see this film. I am so glad that we did! It did not feel like a documentary at all, and I felt totally drawn into the story.
The plot is probably well-known. The writer JM Barrie (brilliantly played by Johnny Depp) is not very happy in his marriage. He gets to know a single mother with four children, and starts playing imaginary games with them.. in an entirely innocent way that would, sadly, be treated suspiciously these days.
This family becomes increasingly important to him, and provide the inspiration for his classic children's novel 'Peter Pan' about the boy who never grew up. It's a lovely, romantic and poetic story, beautifully made without ever becoming trite. One of the children is particularly good, but the whole cast seemed to work well together, and made me forget, for a while, that I was in 21st century Cyprus..
Very highly recommended. Rated PG in both the UK and USA.
Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews
I have loved the books by Rosamunde Pilcher, the best known of which is probably 'The Shell Seekers', for many years. And while, at first, I resisted the idea of seeing the movie adaptations of these beautiful books, I did eventually decide that it would be a good idea to acquire the DVDs, if only so that my husband - who was unlikely to read a saga novel of this kind - could enjoy the stories too.
'The Shell Seekers', made in 1989, was well reviewed so I put it on my wishlist and was given it for Christmas 2005. We watched it first in March 2006, where I was surprised and a bit disappointed that it did not really follow the plot of the book very well, despite being a well-produced and generally enjoyable book.
Visiting relatives asked to see it recently, so we sat down to watch it again. Knowing that it was different from the book, in advance, helped considerably. I was surprised to find myself enjoying it thoroughly this time, despite it being only two years since I first saw it.
There is an excellent cast, brilliantly led by Angela Lansbury as the 63-year-old Penelope. The plot - both of the book and the film - revolves around her life, past and present, introducing her adult children. The characters, at least, are close to those of the book, and I thought they were well cast. I particularly liked Patricia Hodge as Olivia, the daughter closest to Penelope and most like her.
The scenery is attractive, the production is good, and - if one is not familiar with the book - it's a lovely film for all the family. Not, it must be said, for those who want fast action or thrills, but warm and thought-provoking for anyone interested in the dynamics of family relationships.
For those who are familiar with the 'Shell Seekers' book, however, I would warn that the ending of the film is dramatically different, and there are several changed incidents throughout. It's not really a problem from the point of view of the film standing alone – it works well, and the film does capture much of the essence of the book. But I found it oddly disturbing, waiting for events that did not happen, or were changed.
Nevertheless, on balance, I felt that this DVD was well worth watching. Unfortunately it does not seem to be available new any more, possibly because a different version was produced in 2006.
Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews
I'm not entirely sure how 'Batteries not Included' came to be on our DVD shelves. Possibly it was part of a special offer deal at one of the websites that offered 'three DVDs for 15 euros' or similar.
It sat there un-viewed for some time, but finally we decided to watch it. I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect from this: the pictures on the cover show children sleeping, and alien spaceships. And the film is rather depressing to begin with. High-rise buildings are being knocked down by a big businessman, and there is a rather sad group of people who really want to keep their home.
However, there is fairly quickly some human interest. This group of people includes an elderly married couple who run a café. The wife (played by Jessica Tandy) appears to have early forms of dementia. Then there’s an artist whose girlfriend has just left him, a prize-fighter who doesn’t speak to anyone, and a young pregnant woman.
The elderly man (played by Hume Cronyn) is at his wits’ end. Then help comes from a most unexpected source…
Once I got into it, I found this film amusing in places, and oddly moving in others. The effects are quite clever for the time (it was made in 1987) and still look good even with today’s advanced sophistication. But then Stephen Speilburg directed it, and this was the era of classics such as ET.
All in all, I thought it a pleasant family film. Rated PG due to the subject matter, I assume, which could be disturbing to some children.
Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews
The TV series 'Jeeves and Wooster', in my view, is one of the masterpieces of book adaptations.
I have read and liked - off and on - the PG Wodehouse books about Bertie Wooster and his valet Jeeves since I was about 12 or 13. They are full of irony, great satire on the upper classes in the early part of the 20th century.
Bertie is supposedly a typical good-hearted and slightly gormless idle rich guy in his 20s, with a series of aunts of varying character. He keeps on getting himself into scrapes - or else someone else does it for him - and sooner or later Jeeves comes to the rescue.
Predictable? Undoubtedly. But great fun, nonetheless.
When the BBC first started broadcasting episodes of these classic books featuring Stephen Fry as Jeeves and Hugh Laurie as Wooster, I was reluctant to watch them, at first. I feared that they might taint my enjoyment of Wodehouse's brilliance. But curiosity got the better of me, and I'm glad it did. The pair are superb in the title roles, bringing them to life in a way that did not at all detract from my imagination.
I was delighted when the entire series - four seasons of it - became available in a boxed set, at not too great a price. I was even more pleased when someone gave them to me. I have been watching them over some months, in random bursts, with one of my sons. We have liked them all very much.
The scenery is excellent, the mood just right, the atmosphere perfect. It's true that some of the plots veer away from the Wodehouse originals, but others stay true to the novels. What matters most are the characters - all extremely well portrayed - and the humour, which comes across perfectly despite the difference of medium.
The very 'British' (indeed, English) style will not appeal to everyone. Irony and satire does not go down in all cultures. But for anyone who likes this kind of thing, who is willing to suspend reality and enter into 1920s upper-class society, these come highly recommended.
Review copyright Sue's DVD Reviews
