pfgpowell-1

I watched this film version of Edith Wharton's The House Of Mirth very soon after reading the novel, and to see it so soon afterward might have been a mistake.

In the eternal and always inconclusive debate over just how closely a film should track a novel, I take the view that both are essentially separate works, each with its own identity.

Yes, a film might take its cues from novels, but a novel does (or can do) far more than a film. Essentially, a film - in my view - is an autonomous work of art which takes a novel as its raw material, but can do what the hell it likes.

I also suggest that film has more 'sneaky tricks' with which to manipulate the viewer - think of the all the 'horror' films where the 'horror' is almost entirely created by the soundtrack and is decidedly lame with no soundtrack.

Yes, novels can and do manipulate the reader but its box of tools is far more subtle.

Good examples of 'the film of the book' and a 'film based on the book' might be the two, very different versions, of The Great Gatsby (1974 and 2013): each is unique, though the earlier version is far more conventional in its film-making. The second howerver is very much a different fish to 'a film of the book' and then some.

Terence Davies who scripted and directed The House of Mirth (2000) would seem not to have had as substantial a budget as Martin Scorsese who directed Edith Wharton's The Age Of Innocence, and in comparison it shows.

However, I've only seen about 20 minutes of The Age Of Innocence and - shoot me dead if you like - was not encouraged to see more of it. I suggest that however experienced and talented Scorsese is as a filmmaker, Wharton's novel really wasn't the right material for him.

Davies, assumedly, far lower budget - he's a Brit and not half as 'famous' as 'Marty' - was evident - to me at least - throughout. That certainly need not have been a drawback but, well, for me it was. A good director uses his nous to overcome a comparative shortage of money, but Davies just doesn't

I have never made a film and it is highly unlikely I ever shall, but . . . Davies is not a 'natural' filmmaker.

There, I've said it. The House Of Mirth is a long film at two hours and 14 minutes and throughout the direction is oddly static.

And I'm not just talking about the camerawork but the performances Davies gets from his actors. And that 'static' element rather disappointed me

All the actors were, without exception, excellent (and I disagree with other reviewers that some were miscast). But none seems to have been stretched and challenged, and that is Davies fault.

Gillian Anderson as the heroine Lily Bart give a very subtle and, in one of the final scenes, very moving performance. But you feel Davies might have made more use of her talents and that of the others.

And as I've mentioned Anderson and her excellent performance, I should also mention the rest of the cast: Eric Stoltz, Dan Aykroyd, Anthony LaPaglia, Laura Linney, Terry Kinney, Eleanor Bron, Jodhi May as Grace Stepney, Elizabeth McGovern, Penny Downie, Pearce Quigley, Lorelei King, Morag Siller and Pamela Dwyer. All are exceptionally good. But as I say, Davies might well have given them more to work with.

For one thing The House Of Mirth follows the 'modern' trend of creating performances in the cutting room and that is a real shame, the trend I mean. Actors have one skill: acting and they are always keen to use it.

So why do directors these days play it safe when two or three of them share a scene? As far as I know actors - as they do on the live stage - work off each other and when it works, it is magic.

But now in pretty much all the scenes with just the one character of two or three - very few, most are just two actors - in shot there is take after take after take. Later in post-production (have I got that right) each take is examined and an actor's 'best' performance it cut in (which is why quite often we get continuity errors).

Yes, I know why: it's safer! Rather than waste time re-shooting a scene for some reason or another . . . But all the actors in this film have long stage experience of working off each other, so why not let them act! They can do it, and this gang I'm sure could have done it well.

Perhaps I am nit-picking: Davies film is OK, but it did not blow my socks off. I like to think in the hands of another - more adventurous or more imaginative - director it might have been, well, better.

One aspect I did like was the Davies retained a great deal of Wharton's original dialogue. One aspect I did not like and can't understand why it was done was that a whole, reasonably central character and thus several scenes in the novel were junked. Why? One scene in particular was very relevant to the state of mind of the heroine.

I'm sure Davies had his reasons, but I'm blowed if I know what they might be. Oh, and finally, my advice is to forget the film and read the novel. It is excellent in pretty much every way I can think of. One aspect of Wharton's novel this film loses is her sardonic wit and gentle satire.

I sometimes wonder whether I am too critical here in my reviews on IMDb. I read some folk raving that 'this is fabulous!' and giving a film or series high marks, but I find I don't agree and that only makes me assume some folk have either low standards or are easily pleased or both.

So in a way it is a relief not yet again to play Mr Grumps and, for once, to join the gang of enthusiasts, though this Brit will choose to do so with less whooping and hollering than a great many Yanks here prefer to adopt.

From many angles The Residence is a high-wire act, and all too often such high-wire acts can elicit just two cheers. Nice try but no cigar. The Residence carries off that act with aplomb and gets the full three cheers.

At a cost of around $100 million and reportedly using a purpose-built full-sized replica of the real White House and many of its rooms - or at least of those bits they wanted for their filming, a lot was at stake for Netflix and Shonda Rhimes, whose production company Shondaland did all the heavy lifting.

Also taking a bow must be Paul William Davies, the show's creator, though I don't doubt at all a great deal of co-creating goes on for such enterprise to the extent that as it might be impossible to say what is coffee and what is milk in a latte, it could be difficult to distribute credit: so why don't all involved make The Residence take a bow including the whole cast.

The series is essentially what we Brits call 'a shaggy dog story', though its various meanderings, detours and diversions are amusing, witty, engaging and above all they work and work well.

The 'plot' is very simple: on the night of a state dinner in the White House in honour of 'the Australians' including their prime minister and foreign minister the White House chief usher is found dead in the games room on the third floor. Was it murder? Was it suicide as his two slit wrists might suggest?

Over the next eight highly entertaining and often very funny episodes the potential killer is tracked down and when I say funny, it is true wit that makes us laugh, not a number of lame set-ups with a punchline (and I can't stand that, give me 'wit' every time).

I can't remember how many 'suspects' there are but it is more than a handful, and each either has a good reason to kill the poor chief usher - spoiler alert: it wasn't sucide - or has explicitly threatened to do so.

What is notable about The Residence is its sometimes quirky, but always entertaining, 'quick-cut' style. It might put off some folk as you have to be on the ball to tag along, but like everything else in the series it works, and works well.

As a kind of Agatha Christie mystery it is no surprise that it all culminates in the usual grand denouement in the 'drawing room' - of which there are quite a few in the White House - as the detective, one Cordelia Cupp, takes everyone, at least 20 suspects, through they whole crime and then - ta-da! - unmasks the killer. Oh, and as Cordelia Cupp Uzu Aduba turns in a star performance. Well, frankly eveyone does.

So: if you like light-hearted murder mysteries with real wit, not lame jokes, track this down. A solid 9/10.

For many of us - and in no particular order - Frasier Mk I, Cheers and Seinfeld were the gold standard of TV comedy in their time. I won't use the word 'sitcom' because 99% of sitcoms are very ordinary, very formulaic, their humour is just a tad forced and, frankly, too many are so-so.

But Frasier, Cheers and Seinfeld were different, though each in its own way. Forget about the writing for a minute: their success was also largely down to inspired casting and, I suppose, the luck which inspired the casting.

I shall not single out anyone from Cheers and Seinfeld, but I shall single out David Hyde-Pierce, aka Niles Crane from Frasier Mk I as so essential to the spirit of the series that I doubt it would have been such a hit without him.

All those series have something else in common - a sense of irony, a lack of the kind of sentimental guff the Yanks all too often make their own - and wit. 'Wit' is difficult to define but I can say it is a lot more than 'humour' and 'being funny'.

And all three of the gold standard had the wit always to pull the rug from under your feet: whenever you felt 'Ah, damn, now they are going to give in to some of that bloody awful sentimental guff the Yanks love', they did not just NOT provide it, they pulled the rug from under your feet and yanked you right back down to earth.

In that respect, the very last scene of the very last episode of Cheers was a comparative stroke of genius - classy to the end.

The advice often given in many situations - from hooking back up with a former flame to re-joining a former employer - is 'never go back'. I don't doubt Kelsey Grammer was reminded - warned - of that many times when it was suggested to try to remake Frasier, but sadly in the event he didn't listen. So now we get Frasier Mk II, and it has no good reason to exist.

TV has plenty of bad to mediocre to OK sitcoms already, and that is all Frasier Mk II is, just another sitcom, and sadly not all that good. I even suspect the producers even resorted to the safe standby of 'canned laughter' instead of studio audiences just in case it went pear-shaped.

What Frasier most certainly doesn't have is 'wit' in any shape or form. None at all. It is just another formulaic sitcom from the first episode of the first series which is so clunky in the set-up it should be fined for plagiarism from all other clunky set-ups. It is all done by numbers.

There is none of the finesse which marked out Frasier Mk I, though that, too, did eventually pale a little towards the end (and Cheers and Seinfeld did not). But oh well. Some will like it, some will agree with me. Best stick to the memories.