Frost On Friday/The Main Chance: The Complete Third Series (1971)/World In Action, Volume Three (Network U.K. Region 2 PAL DVD Import Sets)

 

Picture: C     Sound: C+     Extras: D/C-/D     Episodes: B/B-/B

 

 

PLEASE NOTE: These PAL Region 2 Import DVDs are only available in the U.K. from our friends at Network U.K., can be ordered from them exclusively at the website address links provided below at the end of the review and will only play on players capable of handling that kind of software, so this excludes most U.S. players.

 

 

Network U.K. continues releases in three series that have done well for them and are some of the smarter past television you’ll find on DVD.

 

 

The archives of David Frost continue to offer some pleasant surprises in Frost On Friday, which follows Frost On Saturday and Frost On Sunday sets, the latter of which we covered at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/8726/Frost+On+Sunday+(Network+U.K./Reg

 

This collection of interviews include religious figures and leaders from England, South Africa, Australia and surrounding areas (like Enoch Powell, James Callaghan, Cardinal Heenan and Christian Barnard) but we also hear from war criminal Baldur von Schiarch (including reflections on how life was with Hitler!), the legendary General Moshe Dayan on his role in the still-key Six Day War and Derek Bentley in a serious debate on Capital Punishment.  However, the stunner is a New York interview with Muhammad Ali at the time he was stripped of his World Championship title for refusing to go to Vietnam, winning his case to be a conscientious objector and explaining his position very well.

 

He claims they could have cared less about his wins or him until he started to talk about his faith in Islam, though as he does in detail here, talks deeply about his Black Separatists views and is (in footage I have seen before) how this point of view sees non-Blacks/whites as the root of all evil in over simplistic, brainwashing terms you would never see in Michael Mann’s Will Smith Ali film.  Whether he denounced these views later or not, they survive and thrive to this day, even if they have been censored and pushed underground.  That piece alone merits getting this set, but there is much more and it is worth getting.  I should add that there are no extras, while the 1.33 X 1 image (some shows are in color, others in black and white) and Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono fair as well as the last set, though the picture quality might be very slightly better on average here, but not by much.  For more on Frost’s classic work, try the actual interview he did with President Richard Nixon that inspired the great Ron Howard movie at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/8540/Frost+Nixon+%E2%80%93+Watergate

 

 

The Main Chance: The Complete Third Series (1971) continues the sharp courtroom drama with John Stride we first covered in this Second Series DVD set here:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/9454/The+Main+Chance+%E2%80%93+The

 

They retained their great theme song, solid cast and good writing, here on 4 DVDs this time and I can see why the show was so popular in its time.  I still don’t understand why this was not brought to the U.S. in stronger ways.  Guest stars this time include Bob Hoskins, Allan Cuthbertson, George Baker and Patrick Thoughton.  The 1.33 X 1 picture (mixing 16mm film and professional PAL video) and Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono sound are on par with the quality of the last season set and we get stills for all the episodes on DVD 1.

 

 

Last but not least is the latest compilation set World In Action, Volume Three which takes choice episodes of the documentary series and puts them together in nice packages like this Volume Two DVD set we covered at this link:

 

http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/9100/World+In+Action+%E2%80%93+Volu

 

 

Episodes this time include a multi-part piece on the supposed fall (or is that decline at the time we gather) of the CIA, Militant Civil Rights activist Stokeley Carmichael in a piece called The Third World, the infamous Mary Whitehouse bashing the liberalism of a name country in State Of Denmark, a 24-hour day in a busy hospital, In Search Of Gusty Spence on the Irish Protestant convicted of murder, then kidnapped!, neo-Nazi movements in The Nazi Party, the euthanasia debate in Death By Request, people cheating the national benefits system, Hunt For The Ripper about what it took to go after the Yorkshire Ripper, a look at a Falkland War, a look at corruption at Scotland Yard, The Coal War covers a strike when coal was still mined pre-Thatcher, The Violent War Of Nicholas Hoogstraten about the infamous ultra-violent and rich landlord in the earlier years of his reign of terror in the U.K. (he is still active as of this posting) and the ironically titled Shrinking World Of L. Ron Hubbard as the then-alive founder of the controversial Scientology gives a remarkably revealing interview.  That adds up to a nice set, though it has no extras and the 1.33 X 1 picture (mixing 16mm film and professional PAL video) and Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono sound are on par with the quality of the last DVD set.  Hope we get more soon.

 

 

As noted above, you can order all three of these Region 2/PAL DVD imports (including the first two volumes (including debut sets we did not cover) that are still in stock as of this posting) exclusively from Network U.K. at:

 

http://www.networkdvd.net/

 

or

 

www.networkdvd.co.uk

 

 

-   Nicholas Sheffo