HADARAH.com ~ Random Review Archive

The Vicar of Dibley – a comedy television series from the BBC about a small, rather eccentric village in England that’s sent a female vicar. Dawn French (of French and Saunders fame – another good series to check out on video…get Absolutely Fabulous while you’re at it) plays the vicar, whose rather earthy and casual style doesn’t sit too well with the parish at first. It’s not a comedy for the overly dignified. We have enjoyed this immensely! And some of the more outrageous comments by the villagers are just hysterical. There are six tapes available on video.

We’ve also been having a bit of a boxing fest, with the films When We Were Kings, Ali, and On the Ropes. Martial arts training has probably predisposed us to liking such cinematic material. The theme to When We Were Kings is one of my favorite inspirational songs, and the whole story of the Rumble in the Jungle is just full of surprises, even if you remember how the fight turned out. Ali is a different take on the man behind the fists, as it were. Will Smith's portrayal of Muhammad Ali is wonderful; even if the fight scenes were a little sloppy (When We Were Kings with its actual fight footage is still very fresh in mind). Together these offer a glimpse of a true legend, and has left us wanting to know more about this inspirational man. We'll review some biographies for you as soon as we check them out from the library. On the Ropes is an award winning documentary about three young, up-and-coming boxers and their trainer in New York. Parts of this had me in tears, and you can really sense the devotion the trainer had for his students. There's lots of footage of the harsh realities of lives in the less prosperous areas of New York. Keep watching after the credits for the epilogue.

Week of June 29 - July 5, 2003

Manor House

A ‘reality’ TV show on PBS that’s really has my interest. It’s set at a manor house in Britain, and the participants VOLUNTEERED to live at this place like it was, well, 1905 Edwardian England. They went the whole nine yards: master, mistress, family, and…servants. They’re really trying to recreate the whole Edwardian experience, and while I’ve only seen three episodes, I’m hooked. It’s got everything – scandal, highly emotionally charged scenes, loads of history, and great costumes. The family seems to have a really easy time of it, while the staff works like dogs for horrifically challenging 16 - 19 hour days. I’ll probably be raving more in the coming weeks about this program – it’s absolutely fascinating!

Here, the website can say it best. I highly recommend this show – you can get it on video and DVD, too. AND – visit the website! http://www.pbs.org/manorhouse/

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The following is excerpted from Manor House’s website

"PBS presents Manor House, a gripping new series which brings class to reality television. Nineteen volunteers from the modern world find that life of a grand country house in the early 20th century is plagued by all-too familiar themes: money, power and position.

Taking Manderston (an authentic Edwardian pleasure palace in the Scottish Borders), a family of five and a newly formed staff of 14 - this six-part series turns back the clock to re-create life as it was for the new rich and their servants during the halcyon period in British social history before the First World War. Everything is quintessentially British: a magnificent house and boating lake, model dairy and tea room, croquet and tennis in the garden, a stable full of horses and carriages - and a group of people utterly divided and ruled by class.

The People
Our modern family upstairs, the Olliff-Coopers, have been taken away from the stresses and strains of modern life to a world where everything is done for them. Attending to their every whim and desire is a team of 14 staff who will do everything for them from picking up clothes to brushing down horses.

All the staff downstairs are volunteers with no experience of working as a servant in a 'big house'. The butler and the housekeeper have been given some training in their duties and it is their responsibility to turn their fellow recruits into a crack team of country house servants: an efficient, discreet and respectful machine.

For three months, the household functions as it would have done in pre-First World War England. Every participant in the experiment has agreed not just to live with Edwardian technology, but to abide by Edwardian standards of behaviour and to adapt to a complicated set of rules that governs everything in their daily lives.

The House Hierarchy
Overarching these rules is an intricate pecking order, which firmly places everybody in the house in a set social position and decides every aspect of life - who can initiate conversation, who has pudding at lunch, who can have a bath and when. The hierarchy is all-important amongst the servants, but it is most obvious in the division between family and staff. Everyone from the maid in the scullery to the master in the study will act in a fashion appropriate to his or her status.

How will each of the 21st century volunteers react to a social structure where there is a place for everyone and everyone knows their place?”

Week of November 9 - 15, 2003

Precious Bane - a novel written by Mary Webb in the 1920’s about a girl in rural Shropshire England set in roughly Jane Austen’s time, but absolutely nothing like it. Pru Sarn, the main character, is a good hearted, truly compassionate and hardworking individual, unfortunately born with a harelip. Of course, she’s frequently suspected as a witch by her neighbors, and told by many that it’s a shame she’ll never get a husband, or have a family of her own. Her father dies when she and her older brother, Gideon, are teenagers, which is really the start of a good lot of the tragedy and trials that befall Pru, Gideon, their mother, and Gideon’s betrothed, Jances. Gideon is only interested in getting as much money out of the farm as possible, then moving into town, gaining favor with the squire, and having the power that comes with wealth. He’s an extremely ‘hard driven’ man, and he convinces Pru to ‘be his slave’, as it were, in his quest for riches. She, out of love for her brother, toils with him for ‘the precious bane’. Of course, it’s a love story for Pru, too, who saves the life of the weaver, Kester Woodseaves.

More than the plot, ‘Precious Bane’ is a narrative with incredible descriptions of the Shropshire countryside, the changing of the seasons, and the characters that inhabit this world. The writing itself is passionate and hypnotic.

American Gods – by Neil Gaiman. I honestly can’t tell you the whole plot of this book. I’ve read it twice, loved it even more the second time around, but it’s still too much for me to try to explain. Essentially, whenever a people came to America, they brought their own gods, legends, and folklore with them. These characters retain a sort of ‘life’, even after their followers have mostly forgotten them. America, it is said, is a bad place for gods.

Neil Gaiman is a terrific writer, with a tremendous sense of humor, irony, and pathos. All I can say is ‘read it’. And Good Omens, too.

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