For Christmas, Rick gave me the complete set of the Horatio Hornblower series starring Ioan Gruffudd. According to Wikipedia, the series ran from 1998 to 2003. We've been watching the episodes (each of which are the length of a movie) on and off for a while now. We finally watched the last one. We actually somehow got them out of order and then realized our mistake when things didn't quite make chronological sense.
I feel like I've written a review before but when I look back over my posts I don't see anything. I may be repeating somehow. Anyway, since we have finally watched all 8 movies, I need a sense of closure in the form of a brief review!
The movies are a great entertainment. They don't measure up to the wonderful character development in the books they are based on (which I highly recommend reading) but the filming is just gorgeous. And the acting is superb. I really liked it when they worked in actual history - like the many treaties with Boney that got broken and then war started up again. Or when they pick up Joseph Bonaparte as he tries to sneak into France (that really happened - well Hornblower didn't pick him up but another ship did - he was trying to get to France with his American and very pregnant wife.) Or when Hornblower is in the West Indies and they encounter a slave revolt, very similar to the Haitian revolt that occurred at that time.
One thing that the movies have that the books don't, and I blame the script writer, is that things get very contrived and lose their subtlety. People either seem to hate Hornblower with a villainous hatred or they fawn over him as really the best thing ever. The funny thing is that they change some of the actual cleverness that Hornblower displays in the books and make it seem like he is just lucky. So at the same time that the admiration seems overblown, the reason for the admiration seems diminished.
Some of the acting is just phenomenal though. Gruffudd is pretty darn good throughout. The actor who played Captain Sawyer in Mutiny and Retribution just blew me away. Incredible performance! Julia Swahala in her role as Maria is so good you forget it is Julia Swahala. She is truly like a chameleon in each part I've seen her play in different movies. She just becomes the character she plays. And David Rintoul who played Darcy in the 1970s Masterpiece Theater version of Pride and Prejudice makes an appearance as the laudanum-swilling doctor of the troubled war hero, Captain Sawyer.
Again I know I've written this somewhere, but the script does get awfully contrived when trying to insert romance into the movies. So the whole thing with the French girl in The Frogs and The Lobsters was just too much and got to the point where it evoked an unintended consequence of derisive snorting on my part. Really silly and contrived.
Anyway, on the whole, I really enjoyed watching these films. If you are a history buff, or like costume drama or just like to look at beautiful sailing ships and handsome men like Ioan Gruffudd, you will enjoy all of these movies. And I feel inspired to reread the book series now. Rick remembers them all in such detail but I've forgotten a lot. (the movies only cover the first three books, I think.)
Two thumbs up!
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