The Greatest TV Serial In History
Forgive the hyperbole but I want to make it very clear how highly I rate this incredible series.A little background on the series first: Set from the 60's through to that strange decade the 1990's, Our Friends In The North was at the time, a benchmark series for BBC and was the most expensive drama series produced up to then. Featuring hundreds of characters, a huge and talented cast, good production values and a truly unrivalled script and story, OFITN set the benchmark for a dramatic production that only a few other TV projects have ever matched.
The story sees four characters, linked as a circle of friends at first, go about their lives in England and attempt to make sense of the world. All four are different in their own right and more so than the broad brush strokes that first mark them out. Geordie (Daniel Craig) is sensitive, charming and intelligent and a long time friend of both Tosker and Nicky. He is arguably the most vulnerable of the four and his terrible home life causes him to run away to seamy London. Nicky (Chris Eccleston) is brash, opinionated and full of pretencion but is an optimist and has genuine beliefs. he also sees his father a burn-out who doesn't understand that the world is at a crossroads. Nicky makes the most attempts to change the world by varying means, politics, journalism and even terrorism. By the end, Nicky has seen his dreams utterly destroyed.
Mary (Gina McKee) is the adult character, being that she has a tough family to deal with (her brother is disabled) but she makes the most of things. She is Nicky's girlfriend at first but it isn't to last as she has plans that don't include saving the world. Mary has to deal with being a young mother in a crumbling tower-block before her husband makes good of himself. Tosker (Mark Strong) gives the most unsympathetic performance as the rather basic Tosker. He seduces Mary away from Nicky and gets her pregnant. He is hell-bent on his plan to get rich and despite many different methods, A fruit and veg van, real estate and a restaurant, it seems that Tosker is destined to always just fall short of his aims. And in love he also fails to win over Mary as the two contest a loveless marriage.
Over the series it covers myriad issues, from Poverty to Organised Crime and Police Corruption. The entire storyline with the criminal world of London is the most exciting but equally gripping is Mary's struggle to raise her son and make something of herself which she does ably. Nicky goes through a rough ride with his parents but ultimately finds a redemption. Geordie however is almost totally destroyed by following the wrong people the wrong way and ends up in prison. For Geordie, the system has no time for him.
The four lead performances are varied but all very good. Gina McKee gives the best all round performance across the series but Chris Eccleston is typically fiery. Daniel Craig has perhaps the easiest role to play but does it brilliantly. Mark Strong has less to work with but does well with the rather weak Tosker.
The supporting cast is a packed house of likable and hatable and inbetweens. Daniel Webb is great as honest cop DS Ron Conrad, equally David Bradley is superb as grass roots Labour politician Eddie Wells. Malcolm McDowell gives an epic performance as vice kingpin Benny Barret and Tony Haygarth is brilliant as optimistic old cop Roy Johnsen. There really are no poor performances and the whole story passes by like a real life watched in intervals.
The project isn't perfect, but as a piece of evolving art is quite without comparison. Over the 30 years of the story, people come and go, die and are born, grow up and fall apart, love and lose love and all end up being badly hurt by the system and when their beliefs are challenged. Nicky learns that the world is a hard place to change, Mary that she has become a martyr to her family, Geordie that if you fall through the cracks you are left behind and Tosker, perhaps he learns that sometimes it is right to be satisfied with what you have.
The stand out scenes in this epic are many, from young Anthony cox's crazy ride into Geordie's past, to the shocking double cross in London, to the sad collapse of Nicky's father to the beautiful ending where the four share a moment of pathos and are "in the moment" together, perhaps for the last time.
In all of TV history, only HBO's phenomenal Band of Brothers even comes close to this level of excellence. Not to be missed.
10/10
score 10/10
spiro_sea 4 April 2005
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1053593/14625
Pages:
[1]