Friday Five: TV I'm watching

Yes, tonight is opening night of the Canberra Repertory Society production of Twelfth Night, and, no, I've not been home a lot in the evenings. But thanks to on-line services, I have been able to watch a few programmes to take my mind off persistently running lines in my brain.

Richard Roxburgh as the irrepressible Rake

5 TV programmes I'm currently watching:

1. Rake - my favourite Australian drama; Richard Roxburgh is sensational as the reprobate lawyer and heads a spectacular cast delivering excellent scripts. The tag line is self-deprecatingly 'the bar has been lowered', but this is the highest standard of drama I've seen in this country.
2. The Walking Dead - we arrived late to this series, which surprises me as I have a thing for Andrew Lincoln (since seeing him in Teachers) but it has been worth the wait, even if he's not nearly as sexy with an American accent. I have bought the DVD box-set and we are half-way through Series Two. I love the emotional relationship between characters in extremes; Him Outdoors lies on the sofa calling for 'more zombies'!
3. Downton Abbey - Yes, the acting is unsubtle, the dialogue stilted, and the plots like something out of a cheesy day-time soap opera, but it's just so irresistible. And it's got Dame Maggie Smith.
4. Line of Duty - I stumbled across this by accident and have been hooked ever since. No one does bleak corrupt cop drama like the British.
5. The Dr Blake Mysteries - Craig McLachlan plays a police surgeon in Ballarat in the late 50s/early 60s - in Australian geographic terms, it's not far from Ramsay Street, but in acting ability and plot development it's a fairly long leap.

Line of Duty: It's just good

HP7Pt2

And so it is finished. And I am glad.

Don't get me wrong; I love Harry Potter and I really enjoyed the earlier books - getting to know the characters and the magical world of Hogwarts. This was adapted well in the first films as we were introduced to all the elements of great storytelling. The later books continued this thread, and then it all seems to have gone horribly wrong.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Part One) was bearable, but I should have realised things were all going to be less like a dramatic film and more like a version of a video game when the latest instalment was advertised as HP7. Despite being intensely loyal to the franchise (I have bought all the books, been to the cinema to see all the films and own a couple of them on DVD), I have to concede that I am not the target audience.

I know this because reports of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Part Two) have been overwhelmingly positive, whereas I found it all rather dull. It's the battle sequence. I hated it in the Narnia stories/ Star Wars/ The Lord of the Rings. It's good versus evil and we don't teach children about nihilism, so there is no surprise in the outcome.

This I could cope with if it didn't just all look like some CGI X-Box game. What happened to the characters? Who cares? Chuck in some shooting sparks and explosions and that will compensate for the weakest narrative arc to grace a screen in a long time. Maggie Smith still gets to do a spot of acting as Professor McGonagall, and there's a decent cameo from Kelly Macdonald as Helena Ravenclaw who helps Harry find her mother's diadem, which seems all too easy.

In fact Harry (Daniel Radcliffe), Ron (Rupert Grint) and Hermione (Emma Watson) make simple work of finding the remaining horcruxes in which Voldemort has hidden parts of his soul. Collect each token; progress to the next level. Basically, everyone else just runs around shouting at each other, leaping from action sequence to action sequence with no thought for orchestrated tempo or development - if you pause too long, the audience might realise that it's got no depth or substance to it: this is genuine cinema for the ADD generation.

The superlative characterisation in this final film belongs to Matthew Lewis as Neville Longbottom. As he stands alone in a dodgy cardy from Bury market facing the axis of evil protected only by a wand and a magic shield he rants to the ranging forces, 'You and whose army?' It's the best line of the film - trust me. His delivery is perfect as he proves his mettel by weilding the sword of Gryffindor (do you see what I did there?) to defend Harry from Nagini, Voldemort's snake and the last remaining piece of his soul. At this, Voldemort dissolves into whirling puzzle pieces, like Chris Martin in that Viva La Vida video. And no, I'm not giving anything away because it was obvious from the beginning.

Speaking of spoilers - the ending (which you will already know if you've read the books, and if you haven't then you're not a true fan so I'm not going to apologise) is appalling. Not that they all turn up as adults with their children to send them away to a boarding school where they were all three nearly killed, but by their horrifically conservative dress sense. I would have liked to see the offspring of Neville and Luna - I'll bet they at least got to wear something slightly less dull.

My problem is not that the film missed out loads from the book (most films do that - they have to cram 607 pages into a couple of hours, although in this case, they did get two films to do it in) but that it missed the essence of the film. Sure, I will miss the terrific trio, but they were actually already missing from this film.

My Newest Favourite Thing: Downton Abbey

As the nights draw in and the temperatures plummet, it makes sense to snuggle up to a warm fire and some period drama on television. As I don't watch reality TV or trite American sitcoms, there isn't much for me on terrestrial TV (and now the Premier League has all but concluded, even SKY is looking rather drab), so I anticipated the arrival of Downton Abbey with excitment. Sad, I know, but it was very aggressively marketed with swooning maidens, scheming footmen and a choir singing Every Breath You Take at a thrillingly trippy tempo.

Created, written, and executive-produced by Julian Fellowes, the corset capers have all the typical hallmarks of the genre. Upstairs Downstairs meets Gosford Park (even with some of the same actors), holding hands and skipping merrily through the gamut of impeccable manners, class distinctions, lavish locations, sumptuous costumes, simple housemaids, plotting butlers, and all manner of skulduggery in tails.

The time is April 1912 and the Edwardian era is ending. When the date scrolled onto the screen, Him Outdoors said, 'Titanic's about to go down', and so it did. (I don't want to give the impression that he was instrumental in this maritime disaster, or that he prefixed his pronouncement with 'Lo' - it's fairly standard knowledge, after all), resulting in loss of life and complications of inheritence.

Lord of the manor/ Earl of Grantham (Hugh Bonneville - scrupulously charming) is in a bit of pickle as he only has three daughters and, therefore, no heir, so it looks as though the estate might be farmed out. Shark-finned, sharp-suited suitors arrive instantly until they realise there is another contender; some long-lost relation from (shudder) Manchester.

Naturally the rich American wife/ Countess of Grantham  (Elizabeth McGovern - a breath of fresh air without being a traumatic tornado) wants to keep it in the family, as does the Dowager Countess (Maggie Smith - divine delivery as ever). With nothing in common apart from the desire to prevent Downton from falling into the hands of 'a man who can barely hold his knife properly' these two team up to take on all-comers and also-rans. I'm guessing they'll prove pretty formidable.

Meanwhile alliances and divisions are being brokered and dissolved beneath stairs as well. Added to the drama is the fun of playing spot-the-former-street-actor: Liam Connor (Rob James-Collier) is the roguishly handsome Thomas the footman, while Joanne Froggart's character of Anna the housemaid (these people don't have surnames you see) is much more sympathetic than her conniving counterpart of Zoe Tattersall.

Of course things will never be the same up at the Big House, but the changes will be exquisitely captured on the small screen. From tracking shots down corridors to the intricate details of ironing the newspapers, it will look fantastic. It may feature obvious villains, crude characterisation, semaphored plot and heavy-handed exposition, but it is aimed at the ADD generation, and produced for ITV rather than BBC. Despite that, it is all wrapped up in a cloak of faux-gentility and classic acting, and I love it.