mike-1828

I remember watching this when I would have been around 11 or 12. And I still remember how creepy it was. Brilliantly done with just 2 actors, George Coulouris and Patrick Barr. Just in case it is still around somewhere, I won't give details of the plot, but the fact that I remember it so clearly after 50 years must say something! I'd love to get hold of it. I assume I must have also watched other episodes, but I can't remember them. Douglas Fairbanks Junior's team was also behind the film 'Chase a crooked shadow' which is another apparently forgotten gem. That was the first 'grown-up' film I was taken by my parents to see!

I was lucky enough to see the original cast production at Her Majesty's Theatre a couple of months after it opened in 1986, and I remember it as the most spectacular and exciting theatre production I've ever seen. The film captures the glorious spirit of the original, and I've been saddened to read a few negative reviews of the film on other sites, notably the BBC site. Where does the BBC get these people? The voices are a little weak in places, so even that aspect matched the theatre production! We're talking musical theatre here people, not the Royal Opera House!

The one thing I regret is that the film version of the Masquerade sequence musically doesn't match the original. This had a magical arrangement starting using drums and mediaeval instruments, building to the full climax, but it's set up more conventionally on the film. Spectacular sets, fluid camera work, a joy from start to finish. Forget the critics: you know they are usually jaded and bored people. See it and make up your mind yourself (and note the high rating here on IMDb!)

In 1975, the BBC made a film version of Cider with Rosie, also approved by Laurie Lee, and featuring Rosemary Leach as the mother. The earlier production is a triumph compared to this one, with a wonderful semi-impressionistic view of this dramatisation of English village life after the first world war.

In the 1975 version, look for example at the final shot where we see the young Laurie passing the real life elderly Laurie. What a glorious touch! Fortunately I have the first version on tape (and now preserved on a DVD!).

This later version, sadly, is strictly run of the mill made-for-TV drama compared to the 1975 one, which was produced by Eileen Diss and scripted by Hugh Whitemore, 2 of the BBC's greatest!.

I've just been watching this on Sky Matinée Movies. I am astonished to find a very young Kenny Everett and other Radio London DJs in this film, as well as the Faces, before they were joined by Rod Stewart. Radio London, for those who can't remember the glory days of UK Offshore Radion was THE Pirate Station which nurtured not only Kenny Everett, but also John Peel etc etc. According to the cast list, Tony Windsor is also there. Worth watching for the nostalgia and all those lovely 1960s memories! I forget the plot, but as a historical record, you can't beat it!. So sad that after his wonderfully inventive Radio Days, on both Radio London with the Kenny and Cash programme, and later with the BBC, over-exposure on TV destroyed Kenny.

Oh dear, poor Ted, he seems, from his email address to be in Education, and one would suspect that his academic speciality is "Mystery Writers". A pity, excessive analysis over the years appears to have rather distorted his power of judgement. I was lucky enough to have been brought up in 1950s England, and I have never seen a series which more accurately reflects the life and people I remember then, less the murders of course! The real problem Ted has with the whole series is revealed in this comment: "At least this one emphasizes the obnoxious, mousey character of Jane more than the others." He just doesn't like Joan Hickson's characterisation. Well, sorry old chap, I knew many friends of my grandparents who were extremely similar to this Miss Marple, intelligent ladies of the Raj who had returned to England or daughters of the prewar middle class coping with the new society that was being shaped. They were used to a 'certain standard' in all things. Behind the fierce formal exterior, though, there was a twinkle, although often buried quite deeply. If Ted doesn't like this Joan Hickson characterisation, then I'm pretty sure he would have not have got on with Agatha Christie either. Probably Erle Stanley Gardner's more his type! This episode is up to the standard of the rest of the series, and it was directed by Roy Boulting, who would also remember this time well since it was his heyday at Shepperton Studios, producing classics like 'I'm alright Jack'. Hence the accuracy of the period feel. If you want to see Miss Marple really messed up, then check out the new 2004 series featuring Geraldine McEwan, whom I admire in the right part (Mapp and Lucia for example). But she is NOT Miss Marple, Miss Hickson IS.

Well I guess a previous reviewer unknowingly revealed all that is wrong with today's US film industry. I quote: "(The LA County Museum of Art recently screened it as part of its celebration of the Noel Coward centenary -- despite the fact that Mr. Coward appears in it for about 10 minutes -- and it drew hearty laughs throughout its seemingly interminable running time.)" Yup, so many of you have really lost the plot over there, so sad. This is CINEMA. Remember that? Watch this film and be amazed by cinematic art. Directed by Joseph Losey, a great director barred from Hollywood for a considerable time in one of your previous periods of aberration. I know there are intelligent people across the pond, but it's unfortunate that so few of you have understood this parable. My congratulations to those that have: there is hope for the State's movie industry yet.