Tom Grattan’s War – The Complete Series (1968 – 1970/Network U.K./Region Two/2/PAL DVD)
Picture:
C Sound: C- Extras: D Episodes: B-
PLEASE NOTE: This DVD set can only be
operated on machines capable of playing back DVDs that can handle Region Two/2/PAL
format software and can be ordered from our friends at Network U.K. at the
website address provided at the end of the review or at finer retailers.
As
British TV was in its Golden Age stride, a decent drama about a young man
staying with relatives during WWI ran for three seasons and forty years later
holds up rather well. Tom Grattan’s War stars Michael Howe as
the title teenager, discovering life and the world around him as it goes
through some unfortunate changes and he does what he can to survive when he is
sent to relatives in the countryside as his parents work and fight for an end
to the conflict.
However,
the war has also arrived in the outskirts and these three seasons show the rise
and fall of such activities as he wings it, takes on what he has to, is forced
to deals with certain truths and realities, but also manages to make the best
of things. The biggest curio of the
series (here on four DVDs) is that Stephen Frears directed several of the
episodes and it is a smart show, but the cast and writing are also solid, as is
directing by others involved. I liked it
and it is worth rediscovering, but be sure to watch the shows in order.
The 1.33
X 1 image may have been shot in 16mm film, but the PAL video quality cannot
save the old PAL film-to-tape transfers here from looking poor. Whether the film elements survive or not,
this is not how good these can look and if those masters or good film copies
can be spotted, they can hopefully be restored for High Definition because the
location work looks great. However, what
we have is down a generation or two and the Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono is very weak
and very compressed, so be careful at what levels you play this set at. There are no extras.
As noted above, you can order this PAL DVD import
exclusively from Network U.K. at:
http://www.networkdvd.net/
or
www.networkdvd.co.uk
- Nicholas Sheffo