kyneton_park

This is so unhistorical (is that a word ?) as to be absurd. This was a fascinating and dramatic period of history, why make a drama about it and then make up some silly plot to replace the historical reality? Where do I start with this. Terrible scripting with daft errors and unbelievable dialogue. The two leads do well to try and make it a bit more convincing, but ultimately the task is too great and we're left with uninvolving characters speaking trite lines with as much passion as they can muster, but all to no avail.

The casting is very patchy with most of the supporting actors out of their depth. I still find having capable black actors playing Anglo Saxon Lords very distracting.

And the landscapes! Don't get me started, it's obviously Iceland with black volcanic sand and soil and a desperate shortage of trees. The little Icelandic horses are very cute with their unique tolk (somewhere between a trot and a canter), but couldn't they have hired some bigger animals. The sets are awful, one reviewer described London as a crazy golf course entrance which was very funny, but also fairly accurate. The costumes are indistinguishable from each other and don't look anything like the contemporary records (didn't they look at the Bayeux tapestry?), the plot has been "enhanced" in some silly ways, I could go on but you get the drift.

All in all a wasted effort - and why? I'm guessing it was made on a shoestring budget, but it did t have to be this bad.

Some twists and turns to keep your interest. But unfortunately they are all a bit clumsy and unbelievable and don't hang together very well.

The good things are the scenery which is undeniably pretty and the switching of sympathies which the plot encourages. But those same plot twists include some really silly and unbelievable elements which make you sit back and groan "Really?" The acting is variable with policewoman Laura Fraser wearing her permanently fixed worried look - someone needs to teach her how to generate a few other expressions, she has this same expression in every show she is in.

Siobhan Finneran Is ok as the senior officer but shows no chemistry with irritating ex-lover Don Gilet - in what universe did these two ever have a relationship?

The supporting actors are good especially William Ash as an ex-offender. But the directing is clumsy and makes them all look amateurish.

All in all an ok watch and I stuck with it to the end, but pretty average.