Maigret

We have been having our daily dose of watching Maigret over the past month. We started with the Rowan Atkinson version which is very good but this Micheal Gambon version is far more approachable and likeable. He is intense but caring. The stories are a bit transparent but when taken as a "who dunnit" it is a good watch. I am looking to reading some of the books now that we have exhausted the series and seeing if they are equally as good as an escape.

If you like the British mysteries then I think you would enjoy Maigret and would recommend it. It is very British and make no attempt to embody French mannerisms, accents, or style. It does nicely capture the style of what we expect 1950's Paris.

In 1992/1993 I was busy trying to make a career and did not see much of this series.I have seen some repeats but was delighted to buy the dvd boxed set.

It seems I had seen hardly any of the series. People are critical of this saying it is a British version of a French tale,fair comment but it is a well written and well cast and watching makes me want to win the lottery and move to Paris. There are 12 episodes and of course some are weaker than others but the acting is always good even in the small parts and it looks great.

Budapest plays Paris. I like the recent,Rowan Atkinson version of Maigret but this version is bigger budget and a better view of Maigret and his team in a more sinful Paris.

The plots assume than viewers would be willing to invest some effort into some complicated stories but this is less true nowadays

Reat mystery series set in Paris before the guillotine was reitred. It's compelling fun to see Maigret slice through the layers of lies he's told to nail the villain. The theme music is fabulous and it sets the mood. You really feel. As if you were back in '50s Paris.

This has a Colomboesque feel; the interest is in seeing how he garners the evidence to obtain the conviction.

I have seen two of these and am will binge the rest. I lok forward to seeing him mount oleaginous malefactors on the skewer of evidence and send them to the guillotine for their misdeeds.

Regrettably, not nearly enough of these were made.

The Michael Gambon Maigrets are very good realisations of the Simenon novels. If you haven't read the books you should know they are less 'whodunnit' than 'whydunnit'. This is what, for my money, gives Simenon the edge over other crime writers. Uncovering the criminal is almost an aside to stories of envy, greed, fraud, petty criminality and the hatreds and resentments in the everyday lives of ordinary people. "Maigret sets a Trap" is an excellent example of this and it makes a great final episode for the first series.

The series was filmed in Budapest which makes a very good 1950's Paris (although Maigret worked from 1930 to 1972 in the novels, by which time he would have been about 88) and spares us establishing shots of the Eiffel Tower every two minutes.

My only criticism is that the episodes would have worked better with a slightly longer running time, maybe 80 minutes. This would have given more time for the development of the characters (we need to know their motivations for Simenon's stories to work) and the atmosphere in which Maigret has to work. In 'Maigret Goes to School', for example, everyone in the village is against him. All we get in the film is a few minutes of abuse and antagonism from a couple of characters in the local bar.

Otherwise this is good, enjoyable TV detective work.

This is a splendid series which I have recently obtained on DVD. Memories of when I first watched it seventeen years ago have come flooding back. But so did the irritation over one particular episode - Series 1 Ep 4. Maigret returns to his home village on All Souls Day (2nd November) a day when a priest is allowed to offer three Masses. Here the priest for a requiem Mass is dressed not in black vestments (appropriate for Masses of the dead in the 1950's) but in green vestments and not vestments for a priest but those of a deacon. When so much authenticity is captured in a production it was a pity that woeful ignorance of simple ecclesiastical matters was allowed to have such free rein. If those concerned in production are unsure about church customs then it is usually easy to find out for certain. But, all in all, a great series - delightful to watch and I give it 8 out of 10.