Viaje a los confines de la tierra

This is a 4 1/2 hour film about a voyage from England to Australia. On board is a young English gentleman who writes about his voyage.

At first his writings are distant and objective. But as the voyage progresses, and he learns about the sea and about a world he could not imagine (and other people who he had never been around), his writings become more personal.

Nobody is a hero. Everybody just "is." The acting is superb, especially by Benedict Cumberbatch and Jared Harris, the Captain. There is no fake drama on-board. The Captain is not a Captain Bligh.

Instead, it is a creaky old man-o-war trying to get to Australia on its last legs. Months at sea in a cramped space around the same old people.

Because there are no glorious battles the voyage is, in some ways, as slow for the viewer as it is for the sailors and passengers. But never boring.

The series has a heart. It is lovely, exciting, and interesting. Cumberbatch, in an early role, displays the talent that we have come to expect from him in recent years. He carries the show.

It is a must watch. One of the best things we have watched in years.

The three-part series ended last night on PBS, which I believe was its first wide exposure to an American audience. The richness of its text and the unique quality of its filming are high points. It seems very novel to view and hear an action play employing the vernacular of Georgian England, Jane Austen's filmed drawing rooms being the primary example of that form of speech. Yet it is the scope of drama overwhelming the senses that makes quaint language fit perfectly into each and every scene. Such bold exposure to an old reality is evocative of literary giants like Tolstoy or Shakespeare while at the same time entertaining in the manner of a C. S. Forester or Patrick O'Brian sea saga. The universality of basic human condition lies at its center.

Narrator Talbot as played by an actor with the almost perfectly appropriate name of Benedict Cumberbatch (surely not even Dickens could beat that one!) alternates between stodgy jingoism and extreme vulnerability, an acting tour de force. Indeed, I cannot recall among this very fine cast any misstep of interpretation. That is a tribute not only to the actors themselves, but to the director as well.

The most impressive element, however, is how perfectly life aboard a man-of-war en route to Australia in the early 1800's is presented. That is especially true of how the motion of the ship becomes almost a character itself, something sea stories rarely take into account except as backdrop. Anyone who has ever experienced mal de mer in person will recognize it instantly, and appreciate all the more how difficult it must have been to recreate within the context of filming.

This is no fanciful Pirates of the Caribbean. Some effort must be expended in attaining an understanding of its nuances.

Reliable. This is the word that has probably been most related to BBC. Movies they make can be great, good, watchable, but never a waste of time, a disappointment, a complete disaster.

"To the Ends of the Earth" is a typical BBC work. Time, place and circumstances that most of productions would use for a romantic story BBC again turns into a cold reality, slapping us in face by facts that those were tough times, and in some moments we almost expect a narrator to tell us facts about the ship, the organization of the navy, the geographic data related to position of the ship. They show us that this is neither a "Love Boat" nor "Bounty", and that a good story doesn't need such extremes to be told.

And as the story develops we accept the fact that this is the same hard work and bad conditions as Dickens or Zola would describe us in factories or mines in novels taking place in same years. This was their world, their reality. In these circumstances some traditional rules of well behaving change, some traditional interpersonal relations change as well. This isolated world with its past abandoned, present threatening and future obscure looks like Antarctica base in "The Thing", spaceship in "2001", desert island in "The Blue Lagoon" or post-apocalyptic enclave in "Testament". They all know that most likely they won't see civilization ever more, and even seeing next day is questionable.

The captain is strict and seems cruel in some scenes, but can't be compared to Bligh. Early years of 19th century are not remembered as blossoming democracy, and ship almost sentenced to sinking is impossible to save without a firm hand. And seeing wild crowd of drunk, heartless sailors (that is for sure closer to reality than crew in "Treasure Island" or Errol Flynn movies where almost all pirates follow their code of honor) you may get a feeling that the ship needs a real dictatorship to get any chance of reaching so distant destination.

This harsh reality is melting in the second, weakest part of the mini-series. Watching it we are not sure if we see what is happening, or some imagination or hallucination of the main character. Too big deflection from the style of opening and closing parts.

In the last part we are finally witnessing changes in characters, they become more human and not only figures that the ship must contain for realism in semi-documentary movie. Here we start feeling them, understanding their motives and behaving, expecting what will happen to them. The cruel and dangerous nature, the lack of humanity and the ship itself are still there almost palpable as characters, but not dominating any more - now we have alive persons to see and hear.

Unfortunately, the ending is too sugared. We, certainly, did expect that the ship will successfully reach Australia, but last few minutes are a typical 19th century too romantic final chapter, with a list of characters, good and bad, and their destiny, that was more or less obvious and expected before they saw the coast. Just saving their lives would be a very happy ending (almost a miracle), but that wasn't enough... I know that the director had to follow the old story and that brought in my mind the illogical and forced happy-end of "Great Expectations", still... any modern slimy American romantic comedy could beat this ending.

"To the Ends..." might be a bit too long (middle part!), but in spite of its end it is worth watching both for the story and for understanding how people really sailed, conquered and settled the last wild pieces of the Earth. At least it will be less boring than just reading history and technical articles about it.

To The Ends of the Earth is truly incredible. I watched it having been so impressed by Benedict Cumberbatch in the brilliant Sherlock. And he doesn't disappoint here, in fact once again in a performance wider in range perhaps than Sherlock he is amazing, as are the support actors. And it does help that the characters are well developed and that you care for them.

To The Ends of the Earth also has some wonderful production values. You can never go wrong with luscious photography, gorgeous scenery and settings and sumptuous costumes, with a period detail so evocative you feel you are there living the moment(the first series I've seen do that since The Crimson Petal and the White). To The Ends of the Earth has all of this, and also a music score that is beautiful, haunting and rousing and never undermines or overshadows the drama/action.

The story is rich, narrative-wise and thematically and always absorbing, and the dialogue intelligent and thoughtful while never feeling stilted. Overall, it is incredible and a must see. 10/10 Bethany Cox

This miniseries is a delightfully absorbing story that takes you out of your familiar time and place into a world of strange events and unique situations. Don't think of it as a sea-going adventure, though, for it doesn't seem that way, despite the occasionally lurching furniture and ocean views.

It is, in fact, a lovely "Bildungsroman" (journey of self-discovery), set in the early 19th century, and centered very clearly around the somewhat naively self-centered and very privileged Edward Talbot, who, despite his having reached maturity, is journeying out of his sphere for the very first time. The situations which beset him and force him to reexamine his life are not specific to sea voyages, but rather they are brought about because he is in the confines of a ship with a multitude of people from various walks of life, for a very long voyage across the world.

Fans of Benedict Cumberbatch should note that this is an absolutely unmissable performance by him. It's arguably his best -- and most wide-ranging -- performance in his very illustrious career.

If you like great stories, unusual period adventures, and/or Benedict Cumberbatch, this miniseries is a Must Watch. Don't let its apparently sea-going theme put you off, especially if you don't go in for that sort of stuff. This is a psychological study through and through (as might be expected from William Golding), and the sea is only a mere backdrop.