Movie:
The Charmer is a 6 episode miniseries based on the book Mr
Stimpson and Mr Gorse by Patrick Hamilton; it was produced by ITV and aired
originally in 1987. The miniseries revolves around Ralph
Ernest Gorse, a lower class man who desires to live among the social elite in
1930s Britain by any means necessary. His usually method is to seduce or con
some wealthy individual out of their money and then move on when the trouble
starts.
The Charmer is one of those television
dramas that looks as if it tries really hard to give the right kind of look and
atmosphere, but this is let down by acting that seems to range from exaggerated
to wooden from actors that should really be able to do better. Examples of this
are scattered around each episode where they deliver their lines as if straight
from the script, without a pause to think how to deliver them realistically.
The series itself is very heavy on dialogue, with only a few characters showing
change as it progresses, which means the pacing of the series is rather slow.
The Charmer is presented in the same
style it was shown, in 4:3 aspect and with a mono sound track, which isn’t
really a problem as the show is mostly dialogue, which wouldn’t warrant extra
channels and the action is always around the centre of the screen making a
Widescreen presentation unnecessary. However, the video quality of the show is
quite poor by standards today, with little effort to restore the image quality,
but there is evidence some has been done when compared to the opening credits,
which are terrible quality-wise. The sound is a slight improvement over the
video, as the sound is clear with no noticeably hiss, but the limit in the
audio range is noticeable, making the audio seem somewhat flat and lifeless.
The disk set also includes only one extra, a 10 minute
interview with Nigel Havers, but it mostly focuses on Havers’ father and working
in Australia and is therefore pretty uninteresting.
Overall:
The Charmer is one of those TV shows that people may have
fond memories of watching first hand, which makes it a more of a love it/hate
it series, depending on when you watched it and how much nostalgia has built
up. Personally it is rather average as any television drama is concerned, which
probably could have been better if they had put an extra effort into making it
and really used the premise to its full potential.