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Post by Dave on Mar 30, 2008 16:42:40 GMT -5
Anyone Else Remember This? Lol - dude, I aint seen that in absolutely ages ;D Was well funny if I mind right..................... www.avi-torrents.com here I come again ;D
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Post by Tosh on May 30, 2008 17:34:57 GMT -5
Anyone remember "Our Friends In The North" from 1996 - was a cracking series and I would definitely watch it again but cannae find the DVD boxset for less than £35 notes and that is just not gonna happen!! eventually found It cheap as chips after much searching, Watching it and totally feckin' lovin' it. One of the best three TV series I've ever watched!! Telling the story of four friends from the city of Newcastle in North East England over 31 years from 1964 to 1995, it also brought in real political and social events specific to Newcastle and Britain as a whole during the era portrayed, including general elections, police corruption, the Miners' Strike and the 1987 'hurricane'. Publicity material for the serial used the tagline "Three decades, four friends and the world that shaped their lives". The serial is commonly regarded as one of the most successful BBC television dramas of the 1990s, described by The Daily Telegraph as "A production where all... worked to serve a writer's vision. We are not likely to look upon its like again."[1] In a poll of industry professionals conducted by the British Film Institute in 2000, it was 25th in a list of the 100 Greatest British Television Programmes of the 20th century. It was also a controversial production, as its stories were partly based on real politicians and political events, and several years passed before it was adapted from a play performed by the Royal Shakespeare Company, due in part to the BBC's fear of legal action.
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Post by Tosh on Jun 7, 2008 8:16:51 GMT -5
Just finished watching "Our Friends In The North" - Best British Drama Series ever!!
When it was first screened in 1996, Our Friends in the North reflected back the social decay of the sixties and seventies, at a time when a further big change, the rise of New Labour and Tony Blair's seemingly inevitable journey to Downing Street was providing the pivot for mid-nineties, pre-millennial self-examination. Tracing the lives of 4 friends from Newcastle, bonded by often clumsy and socially awkward situations, the epic piece of drama that unfolds remains one of the standout recent works in it's genre.
It's an overtly political piece, but in a way that demonstrates how political changes inform social change. Nicky (Christopher Eccleston) is consumed by involvement in the grubby and incestuos world of sixties north-east Labour politics, dominated by the exotic Austen Donohue. As Donohue's corruption unfolds, and the hopes formed by the election of a Labour government at the end of the first instalment fade away, Nicky turns to radicalism and protest, spending the seventies as a political and social photo-journalist, eventually marrying his childhood companion, Mary - herself bruised by a violent and turbulent first marriage to their mutual friend Tosker, which decays with the passage of the seventies. Geordie meanwhile is drawn into the Soho strip-clubs, run by Malcolm McDowell's grimy, fragile Benny Barrett.
Throughout, their lives are underpinned by their 'friends in the north' - fixers like Eddie Wells, whose life of solid political service to Labour masters is blown away in the storms of 1987, as the political tide reaches the high watermark of Thatcherism. Geordie's escape from the vice dens of Soho is complicated by ongoing investigations into vice and corruption in the Met. Nicky and Mary's marriage collapses under the weight of Nicky's independence and Mary's prospective career as a Blairite new Labour MP. Tosker's business and home are sacrificed at the altar of free market capitalism that he previously worshipped. Returning to the Newcastle in the nineties for the funeral of Nicky's mother, they survey a landscape still scarred by the miner's strike, but hope and optimism about the future. Crossing the Tyne Bridge, they step into the next phase of their lives, as Newcastle itself prepares to cast off it's former image with ambitious social building programmes, and a Labour government prepares to take office in London. The symmetry of their lives is complete.
Taking such a broad sweep across political, social and economic landscapes whilst retaining a cohesive and compelling narrative is a challenge fraught with potential hazards. Our Friends in the North achieves all those aims. It is often icily uncomfortable, but it more than does justice to the themes and the times that it depicts. With some magnificent central performances, it remains both memorable, and essential viewing.
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Post by Tosh on Jun 7, 2008 8:17:51 GMT -5
Anyone seen "The Wire" - meant to be well smart but don't know anyone who's actually watched it!!
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