Entertainment For Lively Minds
Birdsong - They said it was un-filmable
Posted by Martin Simmonds on 23 January 2012 - 10:10am.
On the evidence of last night, I think they were right. Do you?
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Don't know
I've never read it but on watching it as a stand alone drama I thought it was fairly enjoyable but with a fairly large vacuum where there should have been a main character. The male lead (whose character's name I've totally forgotten already) came across as just a bit wet pre war and a bit of an obnoxious idiot during the war - I'm sure the reason will be forthcoming in pt 2. The only sympathetic character was the tunneler but overall everybody was a cipher. Watchable, enjoyed it as a fairly slight melodrama but not incredible. (As a sidenote, my GLW started the book but gave up on it, bored with lengthy passages of not a great deal other than longing glances)
I found the book a bit hard to take
But I am notoriously grumpy about fiction.
The horror of war and the transition from semi-idyllic peace to war is very good but the attitudes displayed to the war itself, not least the central characters, seemed to be very 1990s Islington and not what I recognised from the huge pile of books I have read on the period. Not to say its thereby necessarily wrong its just seen through a particular prism and not IMHO very convincing. I also found the coda with the German Jewish tunnellers and the modern day ending really odd.
OOAA.
Also very grumpy
about modern fiction, but loved Birdsong (most of Sebastian Faulks's other stuff is very dull though) and thought last night's drama was pretty good, much better on the war stuff than the pre-war stuff which seemed like an over-long ad for a beauty product. I'll certainly be watching the conclusion next week.
A soporific mess
Haven't read the book, but it's obvious that the author of this adaptation - the ubiquitous Abi Morgan, no less - failed completely to turn it into compelling TV drama. I thought it was phenomenally tedious, with Morgan failing to present any reason as to why we should care about the vacuous central characters. It just seemed to drift aimlessly from one scene to the next.
Not Bad
The book is an incredible and horrific read and I didn't think it was a bad attempt last night. The scene with the young soldier dying was pretty shocking as were his injuries.I'll watch it again next week.
Initial thoughts
I couldn't tell if the female love interest was supposed to be French or English - she seemed to speak English without a trace of French accent. Maybe that was because she was very quietly spoken, as was Wraysford. I had to keep turning up the volume.
I don't recall Wraysford being laid out, considered dead. That was totally unnecessary and not in the book, IIRC.
I thought the casting was very good, and overall I enjoyed it.
I thought the book was terrific
And on the evidence of yesterday's episode, the TV adaptation is very good. There have been plenty of depictions of the horrors of WWI, but it also conveyed the claustrophobia of the tunnelling operation very effectively. I'm looking forward to the conclusion.
Didn't watch it because I actually hated the book.
Take a historical event (World War One), research a lesser known detail (tunneling under the battlefields), add a love story, out pops book. Literature by numbers, left me completely cold, I didn't finish it.
I didn't hate it
But I didn't like it very much either. And it did feel rather schematic as you say. So I haven't watched the adaptation - on which basis why am I posting ? :-)
Unspeakably dull
I thought. I'd just watched the excellent 'Borgen' on catch-up and, by comparison, this was a slow-moving juggernaut with an excessive load of worthiness. Book was good ( although I dispute this sudden 'modern classic' status ) but this was awful. The critics go on about the main actor's 'beauty'. Mmm. Reminded me a bit of Plug from 'The Bash Street Kids'.
One thing impressed me a lot.
The details of the tunnel operations. I read an excellent book about this a while ago (Beneath Flanders Fields) and it was good to see that one of the authors had been brought in to ensure the authenticity of things.
Day of the Birdsong
The lady wife watched the repeat of Day of the Triffids on BBC HD for 15 minutes before realising it wasn't Birdsong. I think if you don't have full HD the HD channel defaults to another one.
Birdsong the novel
I thought was excellent - a great story and excellent depictions of the horrors of war. Dont understand the comments about Sebastian Faulks being a dull author. For me he is extremely accomplished - would also highly recommend On Green Dolphin Street.
I didnt see the screen adaptation last night but a couple of my colleagues who haven't read the book were talking about it this am and were enthusing about it. Will try and catch up on iplayer.
Enjoyed it, but...
the central character was a bit vacuous & seemed to spend an inordinate amount of time staring into space.
Also (this is probably a rather small & pedantic point), it bothered me that most of the cast pronounced "lieutenant" as "loo-tenant". Surely most British soldiers in the First World War would have pronounced it "lef-tenant". No?
The trench scenes, though, were very well done, I thought.
At least its all over now.
Watched the second half of the BBC "Lazy CGI and Gurning" festival last night.
What were they thinking with the fixed look on the main character's face that saw him cover every situation thrown at him!
Also the most unrealistic TV sex since episode three of the wire.
A poor performance from the bbc spoiling an impressive run of late.