The Devil's Whore

I have little knowledge of the historical period on which this is based but it gave a pretty good idea of the socio political situation. All the actors were excellent and Michael Fassbender as Thomas Rainsborough was exceptional.

An amazingly compact narrative packs a remarkable amount of emotion and philosophical musing into a sweeping narrative; this is television that delivers all the satisfactions of the old-fashioned novel.

With a title like "The Devil's Whore" we are prepared for a rip-roaring bodice-ripper...and while bodices are indeed ripped...nay, shredded!...there is oh so much more going on here. Love long-denied over decades of tumultuous civil war, labyrinthine tests of loyalty, vengeance played out over decades, and various other devices create a nonstop narrative drive; try coming to the end of one episode without wanting to watch the next one at once. But at the very heart of this story is an inquiry into the deepest questions of existence: who are we amid our fellow humans, what force or forces rule the universe, and what does freedom really mean? A restless intelligence moves through this story, suffusing it with heartbreaking insight.

Kudos to the whole cast, to a counter-intuitive musical track, and to the splendid visual sense that informs the whole production.

The only thing that stops me from giving 10 stars is a certain dissatisfaction with the ending. Granted, the filmmakers face an almost impossible task to create a moment of transcendence to match all that has come before. Maybe on a second viewing I will change my mind about that.

The English Civil War has often been over looked as a subject for drama, with most films being very inaccurate. The Civil War was a important watershed moment in English history, showing a king can be overthrown, strengthen Parliament, reformed the English army and in the end limits power the power of kings and a tyrant. The Devil's Whore is also a new step for Channel Four, because they don't normally make costume dramas (BBC normally makes them). Channel Four focus has often been documentaries, buying good American programmes, and make comedy series like Peep Show and the Inbetweeners.

The Devil's Whore has a similar approach to Rome, focusing on a fictional character who becomes involved in historical events and meets famous historical people.

The focus of the programme is on Angelica Fanshawe (Andrea Riseborough), an aristocratic woman from a Catholic background. She has rejected God and sees the Devil because her mother ran off to become a nun. The show starts off with Angelica being a member of the Queen's household just before the English Civil War. But as the Civil War starts and Angelica is forced out King Charles I's camp she allies her herself with political radicals like the Levellers. She also falls in love with soldier and political radical Edward Sexby (John Sims). Angelica also gets very close to honest John Lilburne (Tom Goodman-Hill), a popular political radical, and she acts as his champion to Charles I (Peter Capaldi) and Oliver Cromwell (Dominic West).

If you are excepting an action-packed war drama, you will be disappointed because they are few battle scenes. But there is some good sword fights which are more realistic then others in visual media. The strength of the show is the character drama, about Angelica and her struggles. The other main strength is the political background, from Charles I's struggles to Parliament, to Oliver Cromwell becoming no more then a military dictator. The history is actuate for the most part, for example, in English culture some people like to idealise Oliver Cromwell as a great liberator: in real life he took over through a military coup, oppressed dissenting voices and enforced his puritan views on the nation, as well being a butcher to Irish Catholics in Drogheda and Wexford.

They is a excellent cast, having talented actors like John Sim, Dominic West, Michael Fassbender and Peter Capaldi (who I was particularly impressed with). Anglea Riseborough is a strong newcomer, who is able to hold her own with all these talented people. She turns her character from a lost young woman to a powerful voice of dissent. John Sim, Dominic West, Tom Goodman-Hill and Maxine Peake are also very good in their roles. The production values were excellent, and with a budget of £7 Million, it was put to good use. The set designer and historical scenes were created really well, showing that towns, cities and even important building like Parliament were not very grant. They was an earthy feel to show. Marc Munden was a good director, able to combine all the elements together. He gets the best out of his actors and does some good scenes. He makes the violence realistic and characters like Sexby were heavily scared.

This show was not perfect, they were some problems. Some of the subplots did not lead anywhere, the surreal elements did not work for me, especially because of the realistic sitting, and there were historical inaccuracies, such as the omissions of characters like John Pym and Sir Thomas Fairfax. But the programme does show the complex political background with the different schools of thought during the mid-17th century.

It is worthy viewing.

Peter Flannery wrote one of the finest dramatic accounts of recent history, the epic television series 'Our Friends in the North', but sadly, his attempt to write about the English Civil War is a far inferior affair. To me, the essence of good historical drama is that it distances us from our own times, and allows us to see how others could have held positions that seem to us indefensible; but 'The Devil's Whore' invents a fictitious female heroine, beautiful and anachronistically feisty (and involved in a story line that could have been borrowed from 'Thelma and Lousie'!) who seems to exist for the sole purpose of allowing us to judge the past through a modern pair of eyes. The writer also clearly wanted a share of the market for posh-frock romances, and the possibility of a happy end, while also putting this unlikely figure on the "right" side of the conflict - hence, wholly implausibly, our heroine is rendered as an aristocratic Leveller. The drama's general sympathy for the Levellers (and associated proto-socialist movements) is also overdone, in that the characters with attractive politics are consistently shows to be morally superior, and more likable, than those without. Against, the contrast with 'Our Friends', whose general sympathies for the Labour cause did not reduce the story to a black and white tale, is clear. The only really interesting character in this story is the Charles I, knowledge of whose execution perhaps invokes a certain involuntary sympathy on the part of the viewer, and who is suavely played by Peter Capaldi. But overall, 'The Devils Whore' is part Hollywood narrative , part Jane Austen and a sprinkling of socialism: an odd combination, and a disappointment compared with Flannery's best.

Excellently entertaining series with some interesting slants on the history but I appreciate that the writers did not set out to create a drama-documentary. Although they did incorporate some historical accuracy, anyone not knowing the real history of the Civil War could/would be very confused by some of the content. The real Thomas Rainsborough did not marry someone called Angelica Fanshawe and he is buried in the now disappeared graveyard of St John's, Wapping.

Pity that IMD have posted a picture of John Simm/Sexby's stand-in rather than JS/Sexby himself!!!!!

I am also totally stunned that the makers of the series insisted that they could not find suitable filming locations in the UK. I could have suggested any number of suitable locations both privately owned (but the owners have allowed filming) and NT or English Heritage. It seems amazing that with so much Tudor and Jacobean property here, not to mention forests etc that they deemed it necessary to ship cast and crew several thousand miles away to South Africa.