North & South

When Margaret Hale is uprooted from her small quaint village by her father and mother and moved to Milton, a city already in the exchange between Victorian England and the great industrial revolution, her world is turned topsy-turvy. Forced to adapt to this strange new world and its inhabitants with their clashing lifestyles and behavior, Margaret will soon find herself immersed in the injustice of the exploitations of the working class, a scenario that opens her eyes and gives her the inspiration to use her voice with direction and belief.

It was kind of hard for me to get into this version of North and South. I had watched the 2005 version of the film starring Richard Armitage and Daniela Denby-Ash as the two would be lovers from different social standings. It is obviously more current, made on a higher budget so that the world of Milton was completely fleshed out, and the acting was far better.

Patrick Stewart isn’t horrible in his role as John Thorton, he’s just too much of a stage actor for me to take him in this role as seriously as I did with Armitage. Every line is so delivered with a practiced quality, intoning a feel as if Stewart wants his character to be heard from near to far in a tone that’s, again, practiced as if to create an allure of masculinity. I know it makes sense for the character but it was too theatrical to me.

As I said before, the budget for the two series are galaxies away and the 2005 series was just so enormously engrossing where we find this version kind of limited. Not really an issue, I’m just pointing out the fact that if you’re like me and have already seen the updated version, according to some sites this version of North and South has never been released here in the states, then you’ll probably find yourselves bored by the limitations in this one and the somewhat stale theatrical acting from the cast found here. Again, not bad for its time, but it simply can’t compete with its predecessor.

As usual the video quality found in one of these older mini-series released by Acorn looks as if it probably matches the quality it appeared in when it first aired, maybe a bit better after the digital transfer, but still aged. Audio is very clear and crisp and the feature comes with subtitles for the hard of hearing. The series comes on two discs with no special features.