The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club

As many of us that were eternally grateful to Acorn Media for reissuing after too many decades the Lord Peter Wismey "Clouds of Witness," just so many and perhaps more can welcome back The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club with the incomparable Ian Carmichael whose idea it was to film the series in the first place and who almost did not get the part!

Like the other four in this series, this is a low budget, shot mostly in the studio, affair; but it is impeccably "period" in décor, dress, and even idiom. The plot involves at first not a "who done it?" but a "when was it done?" Since the vast inheritance depends on the timing of the deaths of an elderly brother and sister, the hour if not the very minute of the former's demise is the Big Question. Surprisingly, that mystery is revealed half way through the story; but by then we have a murderer to find and.well, I will not spoil things for you and urge you to see for yourself.

Carmichael's Wimsey is ever the aristocrat, here ready to quote W.S. Gilbert and W. Shakespeare (though not nearly as frequently as Rumpole will quote his favorite poets), even though he must apologize now and then for being over the heads of some of his less well-educated acquaintances. In this story the grinding poverty of one of the interested parties is shown in striking contrast to Wimsey's luxurious accommodations and ability to be very generous with his money (which after all was never earned by any workaday sweat of his brow).

As with all of this series, the minor characters are extremely well drawn, right down to a patron of a tea shop who becomes all flustered in meeting "a lord." While the two opposing lawyers might border on the Dickensian, they are both shown to be intelligent and honestly working for the good of their clients. And even the villain is basically a very Good Person in all other respects! But such is the universe created by Dorothy Sayers and it is treated with respect and intelligence in this fine series.

> Now we can only hope that Acorn Media will accelerate the releases of "Murder Must Advertise," "Five Red Herrings," and "The Nine Tailors."

Oh by the way, they are releasing at the same time some of the Poirots that have been butchered by A&E to make room for their insultingly frequent and overlong piggyback commercials. See the webpages for those. And by the way again, a comparison of Poirot and Wimsey would make a fascinating study.

Has the same loving attention to period as Clouds of Witness - but I don't think people said women were 'liberated' in the 20s. Some of my favorite lines have gone in favour of imported jokes that aren't as good as Sayers'. Anna Cropper is a natural for Ann Dorland, but it's a mistake to see her calling a mystery man. The actress playing Margery Phelps - here portrayed as Lord Peter's part-time girlfriend, and why not?- is impossibly arch. And why were George's lines about masculine women given to his wife to report (George says...)? Why was the scene where Shiela (the wife) embarrassingly reveals their debts (and her own devoted but rather irritating personality) cut? The actor playing George, though, is almost too good as the shell-shocked ex-officer. Just a few carps from a devoted Sayers fan. xx

Fans of today's style of crime dramas may struggle a little with this, as it lacks gore, violence and the punchy production values, but for anyone that has a penchant for true crime, mystery, superb character play, and vintage drama, will truly love this, and be utterly absorbed in the tangled mystery spun by Dorothy L Sayers. This is a very faithful adaptation of the novel, and Carmichael is very much the Detective written in the book, his performance in every production, just perfect.

The characters are amazingly brought to life, I especially liked the performance of Anna Cropper, who played the tragic, sullen Anne Dorland, but everyone performs well.

It's splashed with moments of humour too, the fourth episode contains a terrific comedy duo couple.

It's glorious viewing for a Sunday afternoon. Yes it's long, but definitely worth seeing. It's great. 9/10

"Waiter take away Lord what's-his name"

"He's been dead for two days..."

We are introduced to the Bellona club were young Captain George Fentiman (John Quentin) and Lord Peter Wimsey (Ian Carmichael) two war survivors are talking a little too loud about General Fentiman (Ralph Truman), George's grandfather.

General Fentiman is not responding and for good reason he is dead. Upon further investigation, we find that the general's sister Lady Dormer has also died the very same day. Poor George will only inherit 2000 pounds. However, who gets the lion's share of the estate all hinges on who died first. Lord Peter as a friend and a snoopy amateur sleuth must ascertain the answer and if there is foul play the perpetrator. In any case, this is the most unpleasantness at the Bellona Club.

I think sometimes these programs are made for those that have already read the book because you can not put everything from the book into the series the highlights and major information is all there but some of them how they got to the information is missing in obvious gaps. Still, the essence is captured quite well.