Jamaica Inn

Watch on Netflix so you do not suffer the mumbling. Do not watch for continuity issues. I was reminded of Crime and Punishment and some sad personal memories. I was very naive at that age and had never experienced true evil. It wasn't until 9/11 in downtown Manhattan that I truly realized that true evil exists. This level of casting and acting are rarely seen on film. I was duly horrified at many points. I was going to recommend it to my daughter but she does not need to see this reality at this point in her life. The brutality is portrayed in its real form, and many of us in America are descended more from the Moors of England, than the pretty pictures of Jane Austin.

I read the novel many years ago, and loved it. This adaptation struck the right mood, it seemed to me, dark and subtly sinister. I didn't have problems understanding the dialogue, for the most part--yes, Joss Merlyn is a mumbler, but I remember that as being in character.

I did think some of the "night" scenes on the beach could have used better light filters--they look like it's mid morning on an overcast day! At times it did seem a little heavy-handed,and as a fan of BBC drama, I wouldn't put this in my upper tier favorites. But I did enjoy it, found the performances to be generally good (Jessica B-F made a very good Mary Yellen, who is not a simplistic heroine)and the sweeping moorland scenery was a plus as well.

It is so very easy to see what has gone wrong with this production. The magnificence of Daphne Du Maurier's work has been taken too lightly, and in some obscure way, it seems to have been deemed old fashioned, and in need of retelling.

The direction is without equal in all the realms below average, and scarcely superior to some of the worst ever set loose on the television or film industry. No attempt has been made to create characters even close to those penned by Daphne Du Maurier, and all seem to have been painted variously good, strong, weak, or evil, with a yard broom, and played to the hilt on that basis.

Daphne Du Maurier was able to write strong female characters without making them creatures that never existed and probably never will, she understood the evil that people do and the reasons behind it, something which seems to have escaped the sensibilities and sensitivities of the people involved in producing, directing, and even acting, in this travesty of Jamaica Inn.

I love Cornwall, I go there all the time, and I have never had any trouble understanding the delightful Cornish accent. So what in God's name is the language they're speaking in BBC1′s new adaptation of Jamaica Inn? I began by turning up the volume, thinking I simply had the TV on too quietly. When I still couldn't catch what most of the cast were trying to say I tried listening on headphones like a language student struggling to revise for a forthcoming aural exam.But however much I concentrated, rewound on TiVo, or adjusted the audio controls I could only manage to pick out about one word in fifty.

Most inaccessible of all was the dialogue uttered by Sean Harris, as violent, drink-soaked smuggler Joss.

Joss produced a baffling array of mumbles, whispers and grunts, delivered through the upper nasal cavity in a West Country accent so thick it might as well have been first generation Klingon.

Even headstrong barmaid Mary – played by Jessica Brown Findlay off Downton Abbey – had trouble understanding the ramblings of her thuggish, inebriated uncle, and pointed out as much on more than one occasion.

"I don't understand," she said at one point, and Britain breathed a huge sigh of relief that not every viewer in the country had simultaneously gone deaf.

Uncle Joss turned out to be a bit of a nineteenth century Basil Fawlty – a reluctant innkeeper who "don't like people staying," and would rather go down to the beach and crush people's heads with his bare hands. He also had a nasty habit of grabbing people around the throat and shoving them up against walls – a style of behaviour that was also reminiscent of Mr Fawlty at his least hospitable.

Matthew McNulty was in it, of course. He's in all the BBC costume dramas and probably hasn't had a day off work in about 7 years. Poor old Matthew must be sick to the back teeth of heavily colour-corrected, windswept moors full of clattering stage coaches and women wading up to their knees in muddy bogs. He looks like he could do with a couple of weeks in the Canaries. Maybe his agent needs to learn how to say "no" from time to time.

Finally giving up on trying to follow the dialogue, I turned my attentions to Mary's heavy, full length velvet dress. This character's fondness for bog wading at a variety of different depths meant that in every scene the dark stain around the hem of this garment moved up and down, up and down, like the rise and fall of the tidal Thames at Teddington. I eventually found myself trying to guess at which level the watermark would appear next, and I have every intention of turning this pastime into a drinking game while I am watching episode 3 of Jamaica Inn (with the subtitles turned on.)

A very good adaptation, and it's good to see a British period film that doesn't romanticize the characters and setting (well, not TOO much!). "Smugglers" have been so often romanticized in books and films, that it was good to see a film that showed just how crude, violent and evil they probably were.