Bleak House Details

Classic BBC

Don't be disappointed if you were looking for the latest version of BBC's Bleak House this is just as good technically and maybe even better acting!

[Highly rated reviewer]

Beautiful Bleak House

I booked this 1985 production of the Charles Dickens saga about the Wards in Jarndyce v Jarndyce after watching the recent series on BBC, shown twenty years later.

I would have to state that by a very narrow margin, I thought that the elder version was the better of the two.

Whilst the 1985 miniseries was about sixty minutes shorter and therefore unable to deal with all the sub plots concerned in such great detail, the acting, production and pace were just that tad sharper.

Charlie Drake made an evil Smallweed and Diana Rigg as Lady Dedlock was far more tragic than Gillian Anderson, whilst Denholm Elliott was more believable than Denis Lawson as the guardian John Jarndyce.

I must emphasise that the differences between the two versions were marginal, although you could almost smell the horse dung and sweaty bodies in the original series, whereas the 2005 story is a little more clinical and refined.

I do not think of myself as a great Dickens fan, because of the amount of detail that he wove into his stories, yet this drama unravels the plot in a graceful manner that makes watching it a pleasure.

As many of the cast are regretfully no longer alive, this time capsule is definitely a tribute to the longevity of the BBC's quality for telling a good story.

Well worth a Sovereign Guvn'r, now shake me up Judy!