Around the World in 80 Days

This is a great miniseries for the whole entire family. Pierce Brosnan doing a Bond/Remington Steele as Fogg from a kind of cold-hearted but then caring Englishman making the legendary journey. Rambo and Babylon Five's Julia Nickson beautiful as the princess. The great and late Peter Ustinov in one of his fine performances. But the person to steal the show is Eric Idle of Monty Python as the caring and resourceful as well as comic relief Jean Passepartout. He played Passepartout as a frenchman and also was really the star but gave way to Pierce/Fogg. Idle is the real, real star. And the mini series is like the book. Unlike the Jackie Chan movie and David Niven. More like follows and stick closely to the Jules Verne novel!

In my opinion this mini-series is far superior to the much praised 1956 movie starring David Niven. Pierce Brosnan is excellent as the unflappable Phileas Fogg, and Eric Idle is superb as Passepartout. The action moves from one cliff-hanger to the next, much in the fashion of a old-time Saturday matinee serial, and the story is always entertaining. The developing love interest between Fogg and the princess (Julia Nickson) is also handled well.

A very enjoying and interesting series to tell Jules Vernes great novel. Pierce Borsnan makes a brilliant Fogg, and the rest of cast is equally good.

The Brosnan just gives a new dimension to the character described by Jules Verne, and with his similar physical features to the character of the novel.

Just as Brosnan has the remarkable resemblance of James Bond as describe in Ian Flemmings novels.

Nice for the whole family to watch.

Having read the book several times and being a real fan of this and other Verne novels, not to mention, travel in general I can wholeheartedly recommend this movie. If you have read the book and enjoy watching movies then hire, borrow or buy this film if you would like to see a fairly faithfully adapted version of the book starring an agreeable cast and featuring a varied number of far flung and pretty faithful looking locations. Brosnan may be a little younger than the Fogg I'd seen in my minds eye when reading but he performs very well and is suitably dashing and stiff upper lipped where he should be whilst also exhibiting a believably self-conscious even shy air around the very beautiful Julia Nickson. She plays her part very well also and the only negative comment I can make is that she isn't very Indian looking. But that isn't a problem, she looks wonderful anyway. Eric Idle and Peter Ustinov provide the comedy, the former giving rise to a number of laugh out loud moments for those of us with a sense of humour and being on the whole, very enjoyable to watch. Ustinov provides a few light hearted moments also, but I will admit he is a little to hammy for my liking, mumbling and shrieking a little too much. The cameos are right out of a who's who of 80's TV and it was fun to see some old TV favourites, such as Quincy's Jack Klugman, popping up in unexpected places. As previously mentioned the locations impress. And I wasn't disappointed, for example having been to Hong Kong myself on several occasions the sampans and the junks were set in a location that looked to me just as I'd imagined the now heavily built up modern city to have looked in the 1800s. The extras too look suitably indigenous to the parts of the world our heroes are passing through.

So on the whole if you are looking for a movie that relays a sense of travel, a sense of adventure, a strong element of romance and above all a real honest sense of fun - just as the book did - then seek out this movie. It may have taken a few liberties here and there and it does take a few scenes from the Niven version that didn't appear at all in the book, but it still relates the story as told by Verne and in my opinion it does it very well indeed. Some would have you believe that it doesn't bare much resemblance to the book and is poorly acted but this is patently untrue. Its a great version and well worth the five odd hours of my time.

The book by Jules Verne is a masterpiece, and of all the three versions of it I've seen(this, 1956 and 2004) in my opinion this mini-series is the best version. There are some scenes that are not in the book, but they didn't bother me, they were just as entertaining as the ones that were. I had no problem with the length either, to give the book justice I personally think it works better as a mini-series. On its own terms, the mini-series is very entertaining too. The costumes, photography, geographical locations and sets are wonderful, the various scenes and going-ons are consistently entertaining and interesting completely with some fun references to various historical figures and the writing is excellent and has the feel of Verne's style too. The acting is right on the money, Pierce Brosnan and Eric Idle are both superb, and spotting familiar faces such as Robert Morley, Roddy McDowell and Peter Ustinov is a sheer delight in itself. All in all, excellent mini-series and for me the best version, if more deserving of a better DVD. 9/10 Bethany Cox