Maigret

Well, that's according to my memories, anyway. I was an avid Simenon reader at the time - I think I've read nearly every Maigret story - and I totally loved this series. Simenon's Maigret stories are very difficult for directors and actors to adequately capture because he builds up an atmosphere using all the senses, not just the visual and aural. He also develops the atmosphere gradually - Maigret's or someone else' health, the drinks and food he consumes, Maigret's ponderings on the crime or the criminal, the weather. That atmosphere is also tied in with the specific psychological aspects of each case - Simenon was fairly obsessed with exploring the psychodynamics of pathological behaviour, and very much in the style of psychoanalytic descriptions and explanations. I don't recall seeing any other adaptation of the Maigret novels that came as close as this series. I wish it were available.

I don't care if its b&w & old. This will transport you to France -- Paris and the seaside and the countryside. I am so glad this series is available. It has an amazing cast of characters that you will believe are all French. I watch a lot of "foreign" films and have a higher tolerance for subtitles than most but it is a joy not to have to struggle with subtitles for once and still get the full flavor of another culture. Btw, I had no idea there were so many evil old ladies in France. Love the cafes, the food, the wine and Maigret's constant attempts to keep his pipe going. I found the first 3 seasons on Kino. Hoping the 4th will show up.

I believe the Michael Gambon Maigret was shot in Budapest because Paris didn't look like Paris any more! There are no such problems here. This is the Paris of the books, and Rupert Davies is Maigret exactly as Simenon conceived him. It was this authenticity that made me buy it as soon as it came out.

Thus the scenery and atmosphere are perfect. The stories, inevitably, are variable, but I'd call them good to excellent. The acting is solid rather than anything better - clearly there were no funds for retakes and there is usually a fluffed line or two in every episode.

The weak spot is the technical quality. Episode One is an outlier, in that it is so poor it is difficult to watch. From Episode Two it is very much better, but still not great. But then, would it have been any better for the TV viewer of the time, watching a 405 line transmission on an 18 inch set?

Anyway I'm delighted to have bought this wonderful time capsule.

Nowadays TV drama is mostly the same as cinema drama, just with a smaller budget, and apart from news and current affairs, TV stations just play pre-recorded items. How different it was when this series was made. I'm not sure if the programmes went out live, but even if they didn't, they were made "as if" live, since editing early video tape was extremely difficult and expensive. So what you get with these shows is similar to what you get when you go to a live theatre performance: a company of actors working together in real time to present a story. Fabulous! And, yes, there are going to be the odd little errors, just as in the theatre. The only difference from live theatre is that, in this series, we have the addition of wonderfully evocative filmed sequences made in Paris in an era when it looked extremely Parisian. It's exciting. I don't mind at all about the small and rather cheap sets.

I have just finished the first five episodes from the new Network Video release. Since I am an American and have never seen these episodes on-air, my opinion may differ from theirs.

As this new DVD format is the one most likely to be encountered by a modern viewer, I will address that directly. The video quality of the episodes is comparable to perhaps the earliest "I Love Lucy" episodes you may have seen, or very early "Super Man" shows. Unlike them, the exterior shots are fine and they seem to have actually taken Rupert across the Channel to film them (unlike Roger Moore in "The Saint"). But the interiors are a different story. There were sometimes issues with the video transfer process and it shows in the interiors (especially Episode 1). The interior sets look very much like something put together week by week. The standing sets for his office are a bit more detailed. The sound is like a stage production recorded. Even for 1960 some of the acting is very stage-like, with unrealistic speech and exaggerated mannerisms.

So if you can get past the late 50's production quality Rupert Davies and Ewen Solon are fine and the stories seem as effective to me as modern Maigret renditions of them (I've never read the books). Most of the supporting actors are good enough.

All 52 episodes are available, so there's quite a lot to enjoy if this is your cup of tea. But I must warn you that the production values are not even vaguely comparable to a show like 1958's "Peter Gunn", much less more modern versions.