He Knew He Was Right

Let me say before I go any further that I have not read the book, but I shall. As with all adaptations, Gone with the Wind aside, there will be butchery to fit into time constraints and productions needs. Having said that, the acting was flawless; what brilliant casting. I start to think of Geoffrey Palmer as the bewildered Victorian parent whose daughters, and almost wife too, ignore his rulings, and then I think of the two French daughters in their pursuit of the naughty vicar and then I am distracted by Aunt Stanbury.... it goes on and on. Trollope's skill for me was in the drawing of his characters and the BBC have captured this perfectly. The only fault I could find, although I didn't look too hard, was that Dorothy seemed to wear the same frock throughout, and I did wonder about the smell. The main story became almost irrelevant at times.

Love Trollope - loved this. If I had read the book first would I still? Hard to say, but this is quality TV mate, and it's a rare bird.

Once again I find myself sitting in on a Sunday night and what happens, my mum puts on BBC 1 at 9 and i think: "not another period drama...". But actually, this one wasn't so bad...

Not because it had a decent plot or any particularly good character development but because Laura Fraser was in it. I couldn't place her at first but i soon realised it was none other than Kate the blacksmith from A Knights Tale. Not only is she considerably more beautiful than anyone else in the film (especially the french sisters...), but she can act a hell of a lot better than most of them as well. I appreciate that most actors find it difficult to act in the pretentious voices, but why do it then? Is there really a shortage of people who can speak pretentiously? Who knows, point being, Laura stood out around the rest of them.

That piece of sycophancy aside, I think the problem with this period drama, like so many others, is its willingness to include so much plot at the expense of character development. Perhaps if there was only one girl trying to marry each man instead of half a dozen, we might understand better why she wanted to marry him. Or maybe I'm missing the point. It just seems to me that the girls always one day decide they love someone they've never spent any significant amount of time with, and thats it.

Anyway, as I say, its better than most, so if you like this sort of thing, You'll love this one.

Brilliant adapatation of Trollope's long novel. The actress playing Dorothy is particularly luminous, although all the cast perform well (especially Palmer and James as parents of poor Emily). The social norms and rules may seem strange to a modern audience, but this sort of thing kept Victorian readers on the edge of the seats. The setting was moved from Exeter to Wells for the serial as Wells is more unspoilt (a beautiful Cathedral City in Somerset for those unfamiliar with the UK). Vicars' Close, unchanged since Victorian times, and the Cathedral Close are used particularly well by the production crew.

Trollope wrote some 49 novels, although few would adapt as well as this to the small screen. Hopefully the DVD release will follow soon.

"He Knew He Was Right" (2004) is a BBC TV mini-series directed by Tom Vaughan. It's an accurate transition to film of a novel by Anthony Trollope.

Louis Trevelyan (Oliver Dimsdale) marries Emily Rowley (Laura Fraser) and takes her to London. They are extraordinarily happy until Colonel Osborne, Emily's godfather, (Bill Nighy) begins daily visits to Emily. Her husband is jealous, which is reasonable enough in the context of the film. However, he makes the serious mistake of forbidding her to see Osborne.

Emily is high-spirited, and refuses this demand, and matters spiral down from there. Scholars have written that the plot is a reflection of Shakespeare's "Othello." Of course, the central theme of "Othello" is jealousy, but, to me, that's where the resemblance ends. Remember that the character Othello is an outsider. Louis Trevelyan is wealthy, and he moves smoothly in London society. I think the closer parallel is to Shakespeare's "The Winter's Tale." In "The Winter's Tale," King Leontes has a beautiful, loving, virtuous wife, but he becomes suspicious of her fidelity. There's no Iago to ferment suspicion--it just arises. In both Shakespeare and Trollope, the unfounded suspicion brings about terrible consequences.

The major plot of "He Knew He Was Right" is, indeed, tragic. However, Trollope has brought us four sub-plots, all involving true love that is initially thwarted. (Well, I'm not sure about how true the love is in one of the sub-plots, but there's plenty of thwarting involved.)

As always, the BBC has given us fine production values, and an excellent supporting cast. Oliver Dimsdale does a fine job as Louis Trevelyan. Laura Fraser is brilliant as Emily Trevelyan. The plot depends on her to be loving, virtuous, stubborn, and forgiving, and she manages to portray all these qualities perfectly. The camera loves her, and it's obvious that director Vaughan is aware of this. He has chosen to let her beautiful dark eyes convey to us what she is thinking and feeling. It was a superb casting choice. It's worth seeing "He Knew He Was Right" just to watch a talented actor play the part that's perfect for her.

Because this BBC mini-series was made for TV, it works well on the small screen. Find a way to see it. You'll be glad you did.

P.S. At certain key moments in the movie, characters turn to us and tell us what they are thinking. It's an interesting device at first, but ultimately I found it annoying. Luckily, these moments of direct communication from the character to the audience become less frequent as the film progresses.

Chopped up Trollope is worse than no Trollope at all in my view. There is barely enough exposition for a complex set of characters but there are plenty of climaxes and assorted running gags which are hard to get unless you've read the book. It's basically is a series of punch-lines with no lead-ins.

This isn't even directed on decent soap opera level, which might have satisfied the time constraints. Why oh why must so many of the characters mug as they address the camera. With the exception of Anna Massey, the acting is dreadful, particularly the leading men, who look like they long to be in a rock opera or at least an early Disney Opus. A spoonful of medicine isn't enough for this travesty, I'm afraid.

As usual for Masterpiece Theater, the settings are lovely & the music is very loud.