graceless Aside from them not including the characters of Emily (the aunt that actually raised Fanny) and Davey (who plays an even more important part), I think the casting is excellent. Sure Rosamund Pike looks nothing like what Mitford described Fanny as but she does embody the nature of Fanny. I can't think of who better to play Matthew and Sadie but Alan Bates and Celia Imrie. Davey played a very important part in the novels, and in this version they merely lump his part into Lord Merlin; and he was also the one of funniest part of the novels with his hypochondria. They also dismissed the eldest Radlett daughter, Louisa, as really she marries straight off but is the one who had the disastrous coming out ball. I thought it was a fun production nonetheless.

pushkasbreath How can you take an eccentric literary masterpiece, a deceptively casual work of brilliance and manifest it for the screen? Not like this, that's for sure. This three-hour yawn is a hopeless attempt to skim through two books, taking much of it literally from the page and condensing the rest very badly. As usual, the television establishment decide to invest in a classic British period drama adaptation with a painting by numbers approach. All the right locations, props and costumes, but no imagination. This is one classic that needed a mammoth feat of creative interpretation to work. Hopeless, hopeless, hopeless. It's just like British cooking, chuck all the correct ingredients in but don't bother to make it taste of anything. They missed the point entirely. Love in a Cold Climate is about Love. Do we understand why each character loves Linda most of all, with her sweet, sweet nature, her unselfconscious extremes of passions, her infinite compassion for animals, her devotion to love above all else? Are we terrified by Uncle Matthews blue flashing rages? Seduced by Sauveterre's immense, sexy charm? No, no, no. None of the characters are well portrayed, despite a largely excellent cast (particularly Bates, Imrie, Gish, Andrews and Pike). In fact it was only saved by a handful of good, experienced performances in spite of the abysmal direction. The rest were unguided and out of their depth. Despite its condensed nature, the whole thing plods along desperately slowly, and yet gives no substance to anything. It just ticks the necessary boxes, stolidly covering this important plot point, clumsily marking that amusing event from the book. How could they have made everything so boring and dull? Funnily enough, this was the one thing they were supposed to do with Tony Kroesig - of course he seemed rather baby faced and charming. It all comes across like a school play, distinctly amateur, strictly one for our Anglophile cousins.

maceoin This is just about as good as it gets in costume drama. Even the BBC, which is so good at this sort of thing, got it absolutely right, even though this version ran at a much shorter length than the equally excellent 1980 version. The cast is good enough to eat: no-one strikes a wrong note, and some of the acting is downright fabulous (watch Lady Mondore's emotions shift and change). The period detail is, as one has come to expect, far superior to most other attempts at this period. As for the luscious sets, especially those in Paris — what can one say? Watch for the moment when Lady M., having breakfast in bed, says to Fanny that she married for 'all this' and the camera snaps back to show her, not just in a bedroom, but in one of the most sumptuous rooms you could ever hope to see. Deborah Moggach's adaptation strikes the right note all the way through, even for Nancy Mitford fans. But when will a version of the 1980 serialization be made available???

zettel-2 Excellent adaption of Nancy Mitford's sarcastic panorama of English upper class life between the wars. The casting is absolutely splendid from well known old battlehorses of British TV-drama like Alan Bates, Frances Barber, Anthony Andrews and Sheila Gish to outstanding new faces like the hilarious Daniel Evans. The congenial directing has managed to produce some of the funniest scenes on TV and I just love to watch the video again and again.