War and Peace, hit or miss ?

[Flick of the Elbow]

A hit here. But it did seem that it's young stars were upstaged by both the locations and their elders. Jim Broadbent, Gillian Anderson, Stephen Rea and Adrian Edmondson to name but four.
Looking forward to next week.
And yes, I have read the book, but it was a long time ago and in trying to emember it I keep getting confused with Anna Karenina...

 

[Deleted member 1258]

I found it a little bit pedestrian, a little hard going, lovely locations, I'll keep watching.

 

[Paulus]

I quite liked it. It started off a bit slow but got going towards the end.
I have not read the book but know the basic story, so I am looking forward to the rest of the episodes.

 

[midliferider]

Helped to convince me that I should cycle from Moscow to St Petersburg this summer.

Original plan was to cycle around Moscow but now I want to extend it to St Petersburg.

 

[Levo-Lon]

My good lady who loves reading said ive got this far in life without reading War & Peace..I'll keep it that way..we're not watching it..oh ok then
i didn't fancy it anyway..lol.

 

[swee'pea99]

All felt a bit wooden and staying true to the original in a rather pedestrian way - give or take the odd snippet of jarringly modern vernacular. I'll probably stick with it for now, but I hope it livens up a bit.

 

[hopless500]

I found it a little bit pedestrian, a little hard going, lovely locations, I'll keep watching.

Same here.

 

[Fab Foodie]

I enjoyed it .... A lot!
I don't know anything about the plot or characters so yesterday's episode was spot on for me as a scene setter. Most reviews I've read suggest that to fit the whole story into 6 parts is quite a feat so the pace should quicken.
Thought the locations, outfit and cinematography were fabulous.

Roll on next Sunday!

 

[Bollo]

In Casa Bollo it was a toss-up between this and Deutschland 83 on Channel 4. I'm glad I chose the latter as it fair rattled along. If you didn't get on with W&P in the first episode, then I'd recommend doing a catchup on 4OD in time for next Sunday.

 

[Over The Hill]

I managed about 30 minutes which seemed to be 30 minutes of poncing around various posh houses. I did not engage with any of the three main characters so drifted off.
Wifey liked it.

 

[biggs682]

I found it a little bit pedestrian, a little hard going, lovely locations, I'll keep watching.

Same here

 

[Flick of the Elbow]

Now that we've seen the full series...
It just got better and better. The whole cast were magnificent but Paul Dano as Pierre was exceptional. Shame they crammed it all into 6 episodes so no possibility of a second series. Loved the learned correspondence in the Radio Times about bosoms.

 

[AndyRM]

Bit of a strange one. I though it was well filmed as noted on a pretty low budget, but it never quite reached the highs I was hoping for. Paul Dano was predictably excellent, but then he's been the same character (troubled, vaguely philosophical, weirdly religious) in everything I've seen of his.

Natasha wasn't right and a few of the other characters didn't really make sense.

Entertaining enough, but I'll not be re watching.

The best adaptation is probably the 66 Russian version. Although I believe they killed a lot of horses for that which isn't great.

 

[Fnaar]

I didn't watch it, so any comment from me would be entirely irrelevant.

 

[swee'pea99]

I too thought it got better & better as it went on. Episode one seemed rather stilted and pedestrian to me, weighed down by the need to introduce so many characters and get in the necessary scene-setting exposition, but once it got into its stride there was no stopping it. Terrific acting, great direction, and wonderful cinematography that really made the most of some stunning locations - internal and outdoors. Sunday night tv doesn't get much better.