johngammon56

For those here who are wondering why there are so many British actors in a show about Dutch police, could I point out: a) I'd be quite happy to watch a subtitled Van der Valk series made by Dutch TV, but there's no such thing; and b) Nicolas Freeling, who wrote the original books, was a Londoner. By the way, if you're in the UK and want to see the original series, at time of writing they're showing it on the mighty Talking Pictures TV channel.

I was at this gig with my teenage sister, and it remains one of our great musical memories. Looking back, it seems that Kate was trying something possibly new in rock concertry at that time - not just a gig with a band playing all her hits etc, but a full-on visual extravaganza. In this she was years ahead of the kind of show we see at stadia nowadays, led by Madonna, Beyonce etc. However, where Bush was different was that you felt it was more like an artwork than an all-singing, all-dancing musical show - rather akin to the offbeat videos she made of her songs, early technology but intelligent and creative. I believe Bowie also flirted with this idea in his gigs - I remember one where he showed the surrealist film Un Chien Andalou instead of having a support band - but apart from his costumes his concerts were more conventional. Of course, the times rather limited the special effects available to Kate at Hammersmith Odeon, but even now you can feel the ambition of the designers of the gig. Thank god someone thought to capture this moment on video, but alas at time of writing it's not available on DVD.

Just a note to one of the other reviewers (rev-584-459122), Wet Job is NOT a remake of the original play A Magnum for Schneider, which formed the basis of the Callan movie. This is a sequel to the original popular TV series in which an aging Callan has been forcibly retired from the security services, but is reactivated for yet another job. Though the performances of Edward Woodward and Russell Hunter and some others aren't bad, it's very poorly made with a tenuous plot, frequently incompetent camera-work, and irritating incidental music. Having watched it when it was first shown and again recently on DVD I suspect the production was hurried and with a smaller budget than it should have had.