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This television series deserves to be more widely known. Apart from the first episode, which deals with the antecedents of cinema and the early inventors and their surviving films, the majority deal with specific themes. Each was fronted by Terry Gilliam, assisted by a number of actors portraying a variety of scenes and events, in addition to the films themselves (which are all titled with date of production and director).

The whole series is significant for a number of reasons. Firstly, it adopts a truly international approach to the subject, instead of the usual focus upon American developments. Secondly, it places the development of cinema within a social and cultural context, with comments from thinkers as diverse as Freud and H.G. Wells. Thirdly, the sheer range of types of cinema is amazing....the first filmed surgical operation, early erotic/pornographic films, and issues of authenticity in reportage (the Boxer Rebellion filmed in Hove!)

If not already available, the series ought to be issued in DVD for both students and the interested general public.

Prior to 'Manhunt', the majority of films about the French Resistance, certainly in Britain and America, were very simplistic boy's own adventure stuff about plucky men (and sometimes women), with little exploration of the issues relating to collaboration and resistance. 'Manhunt' changed all that.

Of course, it helped that it had literate scripts, fascinating characters, and superb performances. It was an instant T.V. 'hit'. But it was a superb history lesson. It showed the resistance movement as a collection of individuals with a variety of motives - Communists, Gaullists, evaders from labour service, and people with personal motives. They distrusted each other sometimes, and saw other groups as rivals. Similarly, the Germans were not monolithic. The S.S. and Gestapo hated the Abwere, and vice versa.

The most interesting character was Graz, the Abwhere intelligence officer, for he was on the fringe of the anti-Nazi resistance movement.

Consequently, you never really knew what happened from one episode to the next. That was what made it so exciting and watchable.

The series proved so popular that it was extended beyond the anticipated number of episodes.

In many ways 'Manhunt' prefigures themes in 'Army of Shadows' and 'Soldier of Orange'.

It was a T.V. series, not a big budget film, but you wouldn't think that once you have started to watch it. The episodes manage to cram in so much, and range so far and wide, that you really get the impression of a country at war at a variety of levels.

A literate script deals with the different aspects of the story lines with economy and fluency. Care is taken to create a period atmosphere that looks authentic, there is good characterisation (even the fascist sympathiser is seen as a well rounded person with his own motives), and excellent acting......but it doesn't stop there.

The Dunkirk episode manages to create an evocation of a mighty event so successfully, and on such a limited budget, that it bears comparison with the sequence in Atonement.

One of the best things that British television has produced in recent years.