Gormenghast

WOW! Outstanding in every respect. Original, bold, fresh, topped off by outstanding acting by all, but most notably, Christopher Lee. One of the BBC's FINEST. Setting and costumes are impressive and unique to say the least. Cinematography once again, worth mentioning. Nothing mundane here, all around impressive. Characters, unlike most of the crud we get from Hollywood have some depth, which was more than welcome with me. It's so rare that characters actually capture you for their uniqueness; my personal favotire is Mr. Steerpike. All you have to do to see what I mean by villian with depth is watch this, and then something like Die Another day. This character relies on his witts rather than his muscles. I wanted so much for him to achieve his goal, but then realized...well, you didn't think I would tell you everything did you?? Watch it, a truly remarkable film.

I've read Mervyn Peake's books over and over again. To me, the story of Titus Groan, 77'th earl of Gormenghast, is one that can actually compete with Tolkien's "The Lord Of The Rings".

So what do I think about the mini series? Well, obviously no one would dare do what Peter Jackson and New Line Cinema did with the aforementioned movie, so I guess a four part mini series was the next best thing. (Although I would have loved to see this in a cinema!) Good actors and an excitingly stylistic production makes this a worthwhile four hours. Some has been left out, of course, but there's still plenty of material left to build the characters of the story.

This is not a fantasy movie. It has no or few classic fantasy elements at all in it. I would rather see it as a fantastic movie, where the laws of the "normal" world aren't broken - just a little bent out of shape...

Gormenghast will provide a glimpse into our own world, and even though it's not always pretty, it's always done in beautiful colors.

This BBC mini-series is actually a combination of the books Titus Groan and Gormenghast. In 4 - 1 hour parts, being from the BBC they're really close to a whole hour as opposed to the usual 45 minute network episodes.

Gormenghast is an ancient kingdom that must be located somewhere in Europe, since it is populated with Europeans. More specifically, it is populated with really odd Europeans, which sounds more like Great Britain. In fact it is a fictional location in which Mervyn Peake has created an extremely ossified culture, technologically stagnant, that indulges itself in numerous obscure rituals that cover almost all routine events, written down in huge books and applied as if their lives depended on it.

The story centers around the Groans, who's male heirs rule as Earls. Titus is set to become the 77th Earl of Groan, and as he matures he sees it as his doom rather than his destiny, and comes to despise Gormenghast.

At first, however, he's just a baby and the story centers on his father and the odd ducks that are his family and servants. Into this mix is added Steerpike, a kitchen boy of huge ambition that finds ways to ingratiate, titillate and extort his way to a much higher position, hardly killing anyone at all to get there. The Groans and Gormenghast in general are so dense and caught up in the minutiae of their lives it takes them years to realize that there's a raccoon in the chicken house, so there's plenty of story to take up a 4 hour mini-series.

I read these two books once upon a time and hardly remember them. I believe the BBC series plays Steerpike a bit more sympathetic than the books did. The trilogy has been compared to LOTR and the Thomas Covenant trilogy, both of which I liked more than Gormenghast. Gormenghast is fiction not fantasy, there are no dragons, orcs or hobbits. The kingdom appears to be mostly medieval with some touches of modernity here and there. The closest thing to monsters are the huge Death Owls.

What makes the mini-series work is a very talented cast that bring their characters to life. They make it a pleasure to watch, if only once. 8/10

The 2 DVD set has a Making Of, Cast interviews, a few unrelated trailers. It is all shot in a peculiar not-quite 4:3 or 16:9 format, at least the way my hardware decoded it to the screen. Video and audio are strictly TV quality, with video colorful if a bit smeared and audio all upfront mono as far as I could tell. The DVDs get a 6/10 for getting it on my screen but not much else.

This looks like being the year of big budget gothic adventure (all featuring Christopher Lee) with Sleepy Hollow packing them in at multiplexes around Britain and The Lord of the Rings trilogy currently shooting in New Zealand - not to mention this lavish mini-series which is one of the biggest fantasy productions ever staged on British TV.

Gormenghast spent five years in production and it seems like all the hard work was worth the wait.

With an impressive cast including Celia Imrie, John Sessions, Warren Mitchell and Jonathan Rhys Myers, the BBC have ensured that Mervyn Peake's classic tale of murder, seduction and tragic events striking the family of a crumbling castle is a faithful version of a literary classic.

At one point, Sting owned the rights to the books and was planning to star in a movie version - he settled for playing Steerpike in an adaptation from 1984.

It's perhaps best that this ended up as a TV drama: The plot and scale of the original material is far too dense to do justice in a two hour movie.

The casting is excellent, the special effects are fine and direction by Andy Wilson is assured.

Well worth a look.

From the opening shot of Master Chalk, the albino crow flying high over Gormenghast castle, this is something really special. The acting is excellent - all of the actors concerned are excellent, especially Jonathan Rhys Meyers as the scheming villain Steerpike. The visuals are largely excellent, although there are one or two problematic shots from time to time where the budgetary limitations are shown up. This is, though, an extremely enjoyable adaptation of Mervyn Peake's work, and certainly one of the best productions of its kind that the BBC has ever produced.