Our Mutual Friend

This is a great adaptation. It is well cast and all the performances are excellent. I particularly liked the performances of David Morrissey as Bradley Hellstone and Stephen Mackintosh as John Rokesmith.

The script remains fairly faithful to the book, and the costumes and scenery give a very convincing Victorian look.

"Our Mutual Friend," is another well done BBC adaptation of a classic Charles Dickens story, set in the complex London of 1860, beset with the poor, overseen by the unseemly rich with a class structure at it's most delineated.

All of these stories deserve the mini-treatment, to allow us into the sprawl of the period and soak up its language and atmosphere and this is right up there with the best of them. The waterfront sets are magnificent as are the sets for the refuse dump where a lot of the action takes place. The cast is enormous and includes many recognised British names, from Timothy Spall, one of my personal favourites, to Margaret Tyzack, another favourite from the original "Forsyte Saga" series.

Each character is well drawn and complex in all its humanity and struggle for survival. Keely Hawes shines as a woman ill suited to a life on the river, retrieving drowned corpses for their clothes and possessions, and as her counterpart, Anna Friel is sparkling with wit and beauty as a poverty stricken woman striving to acquire a rich husband.

The script is authentic to Dickens and the era, underlaid with a haunting musical score and overlaid with a cinematography that sweeps from the multi-layered greys of the slums and river life to the lush English gardens of the well-to-do and their sumptuous parties.

Much like the mini "Pride and Prejudice", all the plot lines sweep to a happy, clean and simple denouement in the end, but the ride is sure-footed with many interesting characters to bewitch and fascinate along the way and a suspenseful drama to hold interest.

9 out of 10 and not to be missed.

"Our Mutual Friend," a sumptuous six-hour adaption of Charles Dickens' last novel, easily establishes itself among the very best of the long-form British adaptions. Visually stunning, with an opulent budget, no other series more accurately captures the feeling of Dickens' England, from the waterfront sets to the huge ensemble cast of oddballs, scum, slime, and heroes.

From the Pre-Raphaelite beauty of Keeley Hawes to the impressively evil and immensely filthy Kenneth Cranham, or the peculiar Timothy Spall, the entire production finds its success in superb casting, with every character fascinating, complex, and human. Anna Friel's heroine is attractively modern without being "inauthentic," which could be applied to the entire cast -- managing to be convincingly Victorian without being inaccessible or unnatural.

The cinematography and score are all topnotch, and the occasional montage scene employing handheld cameras in the vein of "A Hard Day's Night" works, surprisingly. The writer and director juggle the multitude of plotlines with ease, and the narrative is always brisk and sure.

Even when the denouement grows a little silly, with all turning out blissfully right in the end, "Our Mutual Friend" never loses the complete captivation of its audience, thanks to almost too many superb performances directed under a very sure hand and a very smart screenwriter.

With a wealth of characters to fall in love with, "Our Mutual Friend" surely ranks alongside "Martin Chuzzlewit", "Pride and Prejudice", and "Middlemarch" as one of the finest classic mini-series produced.

I saw this as soon as it came out on Masterpiece Theater and loved it! All the actors did a wonderful portrayal of the characters. (one of my particular favorites is Mr.Venus) The Boffins were superb, Lizzie was fabulous, everyone had the BEST facial expressions! . . . I could go on forever! :o) If you haven't seen it, you definitely should. It is really worth the full 6 hours.

Fine adaptation of a powerful Dickens novel, full of the frustrating spectrum of strengths and weakness inherent in every Dickens story; from the powerful rage he expresses in documenting social injustice, to his goody-two-shoes pedestal-bound heroines. It's about class, love, the river, London, and it's full of great scenes and haunting visuals: witness a tormented Bradley Headstone stalking Eugene Wrayburn through the streets of the City at night. The length of the series does the work justice; the casting is outstanding – expect no less from any good BBC adaptation. The always excellent, underrated Stephen Mackintosh brings complexity and delicacy to his John Rokesmith; Paul McGann gets the best lines; and the entire cast brings the writing to life in a good-looking production - who cares if perhaps it all looks just a tad better than it should. A staple in my DVD collection, highly recommended.