Product: Brideshead Revisited [VHS] (1982)
Rating: 5.0
An Echo to the Others Below
I just wanted to echo the stirring praise given by others for this series. It was unfortunately often primarily praised for its surface beauty, an English "F. Scott Fitzgerald" sort of golden youth at play in the 1920s, brought down by modern world. That is certainly part of the pathos of the series. However, the series (and the book) are really far deeper - about the mystery of religious grace and the strangeness of its release in unsuspected situations, to unexpecting people. This is one of the more profoundly religious subjects ever to make it to the television screen. The performances are impeccable - as one example, the pricelessly funny uncomfortable scenes between Gielgud and his son Jeremy Irons. It is a beautiful series (gorgeous clothes, homes, cars, manners, food, furniture, boats, people) and a humorous one, but it is so very much more - deeply tragic, truthful, transcendant.