Égypte

I came across 'Egypt' almost by accident on the PBS channel and have to say that it was a wonderful surprise. My initial reaction was to think it would be nothing more than a hyped-up and romanticised version of history but how wrong I was.

The series turned out to be genuinely interesting and educational as well as being an excellent docu-drama. While I'd known something about Howard Carter and his discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamun, my knowledge of Champollion was much less and I don't think I'd even so much as heard of Belzoni; by the end of the 6 episodes, I was far more knowledgeable as well as having been truly entertained.

Throughout, the series kept my attention. The episodes were well constructed and the characterisations and acting excellent, in particular Matthew Kelly was outstanding as Giovanni Belzoni, a circus performer turned Egyptologist who must be credited with being the first to really explore ancient Egypt. Discovering that finding Tutankhamun's tomb was not a 'one-off' but the culmination of more than 20 years of painstaking work, and learning of the battle to decipher the hieroglyphs and just how it was done, were both fascinating stories.

There was no intrusive soundtrack and no superfluous scenes. This was a really excellent series, one of the very best and I'd happily watch it again. I'd recommend anyone who has a desire to know more about the story of Egyptology to watch it.

I am extremely delighted to be writing this commentary on a well researched and well presented drama on Egypt.

I am also happy to have had the opportunity to participate in the making of the documentary if on a small scale. I enjoyed meeting Ferdinand Fairfax, a colourful man, all the exceptional crew and diligent staff on the filming which I am happy to have been selected for in the summer of 2005.

Thank you to everyone. Please do contact me if there are any other projects. I enjoyed this very much. Regards to everyone who participated.

Taymour

I cam here second time beause i forgot just to tell you that this is my 1st ever review on imbd..other than that i m one of biggest fan of imbd around padt 10 years. My favorite passtime is to read reveiws on differnt sections of different people,origin.

I very much enjoyed this classy, dramatic and involving BBC series on TV and having just watched the UK DVD set from beginning to end I can say that it definitely bears repetition. The best thing is that the series sheds light on characters (notably Belzoni and Champollion) who were fundamental to the rediscovery of Ancient Egyptian civilisation but whose stories are not well-known. I had no idea, for example, until I saw the wonderful last two episodes on Champollion and the race between the English and the French to translate hieroglyphs that it was Napoleon's invasion of Egypt that re-awakened European interest in the country and indeed started a craze for all things Egyptian. Even in the opening episodes telling the better-known story of Carter discovering King Tut's tomb the series seems to bring a freshness to the story and the character that makes it better than previous versions. All in all, this series seems destined to become a classic.

Many of us are familiar with the story of the discovery of Tutenkhamun's tomb but Egypt goes into it in much greater detail. Egypt presents the events that led to the story of the curse of Tutenkhamun in a level headed way. I wonder though, how true is the story about Howard Carter having a thing for Lady Evelyn Carnarvon? Mind you, when she's played by the lovely, slightly Keira Knightley-ish Alexandra Weaver who can blame him? Giovanni Belzoni was a colourful larger than life character whose priceless contributions to Egyptology are not well known to the general public. Thanks to him, marvellous Egyptian treasures such as the Head of the Younger Memnon are now in the British Museum. Thanks to CGI, Egypt shows us Abu Simbel exactly as it was found by Belzoni, half buried by the sandstorms of three millenia. CGI also shows us what these monuments looked like when they were newly built and it's very strange as hitherto it was hard to conceive of them as anything other than ruins. Although the discovery of the Rosetta Stone is well known this series tells us about another name not known to many people, Jean Francois Champollion. I used to think that with the discovery of the Rosetta Stone translating the hieroglyphs would have been as straightforward as looking up a language dictionary. Egypt shows us that it wasn't as easy as that. Champollion deciphered their meaning and enabled the reason for the construction of the Great Pyramid at Gizeh to be discovered. I recommend buying the DVD very strongly. As another reviewer says, it can be watched over and over again. It's great.