Our Friends in the North

When this drama first hit our screens in '96, there was a certain cynicism about lengthy serials set in contemporary times, and whether it could hold a nation's attention. Casting was wide and varied - the four leads, who grow up together, grow apart, and grow together again - were played with class by Gina MacKee, Chris Eccleston, Daniel Craig and Mark Strong. Others in support included David Bradley, Peter Vaughan, Malcolm McDowell, David Schofield, Daniel Casey, and many more. Each episode moved the story along through its thirty-year span, while we watched each character reach their highs and lows until the last episode which left them all reunited.

Two things in particular stand out - the episode about the miners' strike, which was brilliantly done; and the closing credits over which Oasis' 'Don't Look Back in Anger' was played. I can't think of a better tune to close this excellent serial. One of the BBC's best.

One of the finest moments of British Television and any other television for that matter. Three decades in the lives of 4 friends covering their youth, their dreams, defeats, disappointments and tragedies while at the same time showing us all the changes happening in the English society from 1960's-1990's. First class acting, wonderful use of music to depict the time period and marvelous production values make this one of the viewing events that will stay forever in your memory since after watching this it will be hard to find anything better.

Masterpiece if there was one

This series is excellent, both heart warming and tragic, as the characters go through thirty years of youth to middle age experiencing the cycle of life as the society and its politics evolve in a very haphazard way. The major actors are Gina McKee, Daniel Craig, Mark Strong and Chris Ecclestone. I like the role of Gina McKee who is a favourite of mine. Aristocratic and sexy, she has a tremendous presence in any role she takes. The love scene with Chris Ecclestone in the first show is one of the most stunning I've ever seen. Over time, she evolves to become the most admirable character. Ecclestone is the political idealist who finds that the practise of politics doesn't measure up to his ambition to make life better for ordinary people. He's a man in a hurry. To his credit, he does care about people but his ambition overrules his judgement. Mark Strong seemed to be the least impressive and the one most likely to mess up. This he did. In time, however, he matured and found happiness in a second relationship. Daniel Craig grew up in a dysfunctional family. As a youth, he seemed to handle it well and was a model youth. Time and the wrong people eventually took their toll. When it was over, I was disappointed but also hopeful that sometimes things can go well. I seem to be one of the relatively few viewers in North America to follow this series. I was fortunate to be a subscriber to Britbox because I developed a taste for British television watching PBS from 1975 on. British television now provides more gritty fare than in the days of Alastair Cooke. I'm not complaining because this series is a good example of the best of British television. It was actually made in 1996 but I only became aware of it through Britbox.

Our friends in the North is one of those things you grow to admire in time, long after the details have left your mind and its melancholy essence has been absorbed by your consciousness. You will go back to this essence many many times as you grow old and find yourself identifying with someone or the other in this majestic work.

It covers 30 years for the most turbulent period in modern British history starting from the early sixties with its anxious flirtations with radical Marxism and ending in the bland nineties enmeshed in the muck of decadent consumerism. The plot revolves around four friends who are archetypes of the times and the greatness of Peter Flannery's script is to lay out in exquisite detail the fantastic interplay of archetypes and time. Some of the greatest of British actors played their life defining roles like Gina Mckee, Christopher Ecclestone, Mark Strong and a young Daniel Craig whose performance alone should make it worth seeing. Its a kind of work which is now largely impossible today primarily because of the class it focuses on; lower middle class Britain and their problems. In our post political age, where the public has been largely relegated to be spectators to their lives, its refreshing to witness a time where politics was the heart and soul of many lives who wanted to change the world albeit a bit foolishly. Nick ( Ecclestone ) is one such character. The cinematography is not the best but the plot makes up for it. Multi episode TV series like this was a creation of British TV and there is no better example to show how time is such a valuable thing to have in narrative expositions. Every episode focuses on a year and three decades gives the audience the chance to see characters play out their fated, entangled lives amidst all their joys and failures, swimming in the turbulence of sweeping historical changes.Every work of literature invariably comes up against the shores of narrative completeness where it faces its most troubled critics. Our Friends in the North has that self contained completeness where you are hard pressed to find leakages and thus you can say with a proud boast that its complete. There is an inevitability to the flow of lives that gives it a self sustaining rhythm till the end where you realize that nothing could have been any different. You feel for every character because by the time you have reached the end, you have come to believe in the old Buddhist maxim which exhorts man to believe in no judge-mental God who sits and punishes from above but to believe in man himself who weaves his own destiny, thread by thread which at the end of time, can chain him to the rock or carry him over to the heavens. A masterpiece which will last many a storm of time.

This is truly one of the finest series to come out of Britain. It took writer Flannery 15 years to get the series made, and when it was eventually produced the UK channel BBC2 spent their entire drama budget for the year on it. However, it was a fine investment.

The lives of four friends from Newcastle are followed from 1964 to 1995, against a backdrop of massive social and political change. It says much for the quality of the writing and the performances of the principal actors that you find yourself getting heavily involved with the characters' lives and caring a great deal for them. The leads have gone on to further successes, but this series catches them all early in their careers, and on astonishing form.

It was, in hindsight, a good thing that it took so long to get the show made. Flannery's original play ended in 1980, but the elongated production process enabled him to write more and more about the characters' fortunes, and take them another 15 years into the future. The most changed character was Geordie, who served in the army in Rhodesia in the original play, but finds himself instead in swinging London in a strip club in the finished series.

Do yourself a favour. Pick up the DVD set, and savour 14 hours of top television. It will make you think, it will move you, and we will never see its like again.