A Perfect Hero – Series One
Picture:
C+ Sound: B- Extras: C- Episodes: B-
One of
the oddest dramas about Britain in WWII is A Perfect Hero (1991), which has a good cast but is maybe more
British and eccentric than usual. It
follows four young men who fly planes against the Nazis as the only defense
against the Germans. In all this, is has
odd humor and an even odder theme song.
Watching this is interesting, especially when adding the cats.
The more
known names include Nigel Havers, Fiona Gilles, James Fox, Barbara Leigh-Hunt,
and Joanna Lumley (Absolutely Fabulous,
The New Avengers) as a popular,
older actress. The early twist in the
first of the six shows on two DVDs in this set is that pilot Hugh manages to
land up badly burned and in the hospital after shooting down several Nazi
fighters. The news travels slowly, in
part because his mother (Leigh-Hunt) does not want to put her son’s news out on
the street. We have seen this kind of
story before, but the creato0rs stick to the point and that is why it never
drags.
Some
edits are unintentionally funny and awkward, so that further hurts the
presentation, but it is undeniably British, so it has that going for it. The dog fights in the air are different than
what we have seen before, with limited editing and some unusually static shots
for such a thing. The show, in its
production design and costumes, is consistent throughout. The show becomes about its characters even
more than the war and does leave itself open for a continuation, but whether
we’ll seer that or not remains to be seen.
The full
frame color image was shot on professional analog PAL tape and looks good for
its age. The Videography by Ernest
Vincze, B.S.C., is interesting throughout, sometimes breaking the video white
rule, meaning whiter than would usually be used is present. The sound is available in Dolby Digital 2.0
Mono and a better 5.1 AC-3 mix that is pretty good for a TV show of this
time. The few extras include stills and
five previews per DVD for other British TV boxed sets from Goldhil, but you can
find out more about all their titles at www.goldhil.com
and order some fine, hard-to-get DVDs now.
- Nicholas Sheffo
