Television Archaeology – Manhunt

You’ve been working away on a television series for months. You have your scheduled transmission slot. You want as many people as possible to watch it. How do you promote the living daylights out of it? In the United Kingdom during the first few decades of television, your first port of call was obvious. Get your series featured in the listings magazines.

I’ve written about Manhunt before. First broadcast in the UK on the 2nd January 1970 on the ITV Network it ran straight through for 26 weeks, ending rather neatly on June 26th. While the country was going World Cup Bonkers, ITV broadcast a sobering reminder of an altogether different conflict as Jimmy, Nina and Vincent attempted to fight their way through war-torn France in a desperate race to get vital information back to London. Alfred Lynch, Peter Barkworth did weekly battle with the Nazi menace as personified by Philip Madoc, Robert Hardy, Tony Beckley et al in a series which remains my single favourite ITV drama ever broadcast. Nothing’s come close to touching it. I don’t know if anything ever shall.

It deserved the widest audience possible. To the credit of the ITV listings magazine TV Times, strenous efforts were made to ensure that Manhunt got just that. It may have sunk into relative obscurity in the intervening years but for the six months it was being broadcast, I’m pleased to say that TVT went hell-for-leather to make sure that we tuned in every Friday evening. Let’s have a look, see how they went about it. Click on the jpegs for a higher-res scan. All listings copyright TV Times.

Week 1  fairly low-key start. A box-out on the listings page for the Friday night, but a decent enough summary of what’s to come. Those still loitering near the exits after On The Buses would – it’s safe to say – have been greeted with a remarkable tonal shift in their evening’s viewing.

Week 2

Nothing too spectacular. A basic listing,but enough to whet the appetite. The plot-summary – as with every week – is bang on the money. Either someone is watching preview tapes avidly or the press-pack sent out by the production office is extraordinarily detailed.

Week 3

Blimey, here we go. An unexpected start to the luxurious extended coverage afforded to Manhunt, with a piece on the booming trade in Nazi memorabillia. That’s Richard Hurndall in full costume, looking altogether too comfortable.

Week 4

Week 5

Another oblique approach this week, with more focus being paid on the filming of the series rather than the performers. Makes for an arresting headline, though.

Week 6/7

Week 8

Time to get personal. A revealing and rather sad interview with Alfred Lynch.

Week 9

From the sublime to the ridiculous. Peter Barkworth’s cooking tips. Hey-ho. Rough with the smooth…

Weeks 10-16

Something of a desert, as presumably with the series up and running the listings people are happy to leave things to cook by themselves. Lots of other series to promote, all jostling for page-time.

Week 17

Time for another promotional push as Robert Hardy’s increasing presence in the series (becoming more or less the fourth regular lead by this stage) warrants another “at-home-with” feature. And what a home. Bonus picture of Hunky George Sewell on the listings page, you’ll note.

Week 18/19

Fans of the Madoc rejoice, for here he is at last.

Week 20

Manhunt finally makes the front cover – sort of. An enticing strapline slapped over Des O’Connor’s mush leads us towards Cyd Hayman’s fashion shoot. Well, a gal needs something nice to wear after all those French Ditches.

  

Week 21

Week 22

The extraordinary Intent To Steal this week, an episode with no dialogue whatsoever after the opening recap. A fact not lost on TV Times. Out of all the assorted promotional material here, this pic of Alfred Lynch and Peter Barkworth is by far my favourite. The article also gives away that the working title for the episode appears to have been The Raid. Makes sense.

Week 23

Week 24

The Gratz/Lutzig conflict takes centre stage this week, edging all of the other regulars out. Another series high-point. TVTimes has obviously been taking note of how this particular thread has been developing.

Week 25/26

Before we know it, it’s all over. A simple listing for the penultimate week, a pic of Cyd and Maggie for the final listings page and they’re off. A low-key exit for a series which – once I started digging – revealed itself to be far more visibly promoted than I’d at first assumed. Well deserved coverage of one of the commercial network’s unfairly neglected treasures. We shall never see their like again.

Review – Manhunt Part 4

Here we are, then. The final part. Hope you’ve enjoyed this. It was an absolute pleasure to write this, even more of a pleasure to watch “Manhunt” from start to finish. As ever, thanks to Jon Melville at Adventures in Primetime for allowing me to republish.

WARNING – SPOILERS!!!

Back again for the final stretch. It’s been a little while since the last report, and it’s simply because there’s a lot in these four episodes to process. So much happens, and I really couldn’t come to grips with it at first. I needed time to gather my thoughts.

As we rejoin the gang, there’s another escape plan in progress. Alfred Shaugnessy’s The Train May Be Late sees several of the cast regulars making their way to the coast by rail. Vincent and Adelaide are attempting to get the piece of metal they nicked during Intend To Steal out and across the English Channel.

With typical audacity, they’re doing it by travelling on a train packed with Germans. Adelaide’s the one with the responsibility for carrying the metal, and she’s doing it with characteristic elan – even accepting help from one of the soldiery as he offers to place her basket in the luggage rack for her.

Adelaide eyes the other occupants of the carriage with amused detachment, and a touch of the predator. Every time the train went through a tunnel, I kept expecting the camera to cut back and reveal one less occupant, and Adelaide sitting back with a happy burp.

Further up the carriage, Vincent is stalking the corridors. Presumably there as lookout and general aide to Adelaide in case anything goes wrong, he’s unfortunately reckoned without Manhunt’s resident chaos magnet.

Yes, several carriages up, Nina is on board. Rather sensibly Jimmy’s sitting this one out, said to be working back at the factory. A factory which, lest we forget, was bombed to oblivion last week. Presumably there’s a lot of sweeping up to do.

It’s interesting the way this episode is framed, switching between carriages. Nina and Adelaide are more or less in the same position, each having acquired a high-ranking German officer who won’t leave them alone. In Adelaide’s case, she handles it effortlessly, carrying out polite conversation (and dropping Lutzig’s name into the conversation occasionally when things get too fresh).

Predictably, Nina handles things with considerably less skill, unravelling at the seams so fast that it’s a surprise the carriage isn’t full of wool by the end of the episode. She’s got a younger officer draped over her – one who gets violently drunk as the episode wears on (presumably to stave off the boredom, or maybe it’s the only way he can stand to be anywhere near Nina. I know how he feels).

Of course, this being Manhunt, Nina’s pulchritudinous charms bring him under her spell almost immediately and he’s trying it on before the first advert break. Meanwhile, across the carriage is Spiegel, Geoffrey Whitehead making a welcome return to the series after Degrade and Rule. He’s watching with an eagle eye – in fact, he doesn’t take his eyes off Nina. But it’s all a feint on the part of the writer – he’s actually after the officer, who turns out to be a Polish escapee, making a break for it in disguise.

All of which is a hindrance to poor old Vincent, who continues to have the worst luck of anyone in television drama – as the train is boarded by Special Intelligence Officers, his slight resemblance to the description of the Pole is enough to cause him to be arrested and taken for interrogation. Poor sod.

Of course, he’s acting suspiciously because he’s been thrown into a tizz by encountering Nina again – there’s a veddy veddy British encounter in a not-veddy veddy British location, as the two reacquaint themselves in the train’s lavatory. It’s all cheek to cheek embraces and extremes of quivering, restrained emotion on Vincent’s part. Poor man – no good can come of this.

As is now traditional with Manhunt, the tension ratchets tighter and tighter, until Spiegel finally twigs that there’s something going on here. With Nina constantly flaking out and “feeling unwell” and Vincent stalking the corridors looking worried, he’d have to be a fool not to. Before too long, all of our protagonists are held at gunpoint in a single carriage by Spiegel, and it looks like the series may come to a premature end.

Thankfully, the British choose this moment to mount an air raid. In the darkness and confusion there’s another close-quarters scuffle, ended decisively by Adelaide shooting Spiegel.

Adelaide’s proven to be a total revelation as this series has progressed. Initially seeming to be a one-shot interruption to the main plotline, her Mae West-esque persona is merely the start of it – by turns flippant, steely, matronly, playful… Adelaide really does seem to be the one character who has her head screwed on. When anyone needs something done, you can be sure if she’s involved there’s a chance it might actually happen.

Here, she takes control when no-one else will, and proves to be the only thing that stops Nina and Vincent coming to a bad end. Admittedly, it’s self defence, since Spiegel’s got his sights on her as well – but even so, her level-headedness, common sense and general refusal to play the submissive downtrodden female have made her one Manhunt’s trump cards. A wonderful character.

The RAF’s timely intervention may have saved Adelaide, Vincent and Nina’s skins, but it has meant that the trainline is bombed to oblivion, and everyone has to turn back to Bordeaux. In a series of wasted efforts and futile gestures, this is merely the latest setback, and our heroes set their shoulders grimly as they head back to square one.

While we’re waiting for them to get there, the spotlight swings onto our resident scene-stealers as Gratz and Lutzig finally get an episode to themselves.

Little Man, What Next? (Part 1) sees Vincent Tilsley return for another of his forensic locked room examinations of the human psyche and it initially seems somewhat jarring – with only three episodes to go, why is the focus suddenly switched from the three leads for an entire episode?

On reflection though, this episode is absolutely necessary, as events have to be set in motion to bring about the conclusion of the series. Gratz needs to be maneuvered into a position where he is able to interact with the fugitives and Lutzig needs to show some degree of progress to keep him onside with his superiors.

As it is, he comfortably sees out another higher ranking officer this week (I think that’s his third, over the series run – there’s something to be said for keeping your head down), and ends this episode in the strongest position possible.

Barkworth, Lynch and Hayman are totally absent this week, meaning the spotlight shines firmly on the ancient and venerable firm of Hardy and Madoc. Can they shoulder the burden? What do you think? Of course they can.

We’re greeted to the remarkable sight of a trouserless Robert Hardy as the episode opens, as Gratz has been picked up for suspicious behaviour, wandering the streets with a fistful of money he can’t account for, and travel plans he can’t justify.

Lutzig – seizing the opportunity to lord it over the man who’s spent several months outthinking and outmanoeuvring him, decides to extract as much information out of Gratz while he has the chance – finally, we might find out just how much Gratz has managed to extract from Nina’s noggin.

And so begins a most elegantly choreographed dance, as each man flip-flops from interrogator to victim and back again over an engrossing fifty minutes. Apart from Madoc and Hardy, the only other named characters are Gratz’s wife Sarah and Lutzig’s superior, Zander.

Unfortunately, both show up a unique weakness in the way Manhunt is presented – when you’ve got a topline supporting cast, if any of the performers who come in for one or two episodes are anything less than perfect it really shows.

There are scenes here where Gratz is confronted by a brutally anti-semitic wife on the warpath. Having discovered exactly who her husband is sleeping with – it’s never clearly revealed whether she found out by other means, or whether Lutzig took great pleasure in telling her – Jane Jordan Rogers portrays her disgust with her husband by shouting. A lot.

What she’s shouting is horrendous, vile, nasty sentiments all the more disgusting for coming from a normal human being. Sarah isn’t some twisted evil character, she’s an ordinary woman, and these attitudes are what she’s been brought up to believe. It’s horrible, and it would be even more so were the performance a little more accomplished. As it is, it’s powerful,  just not as much as it could be.

Meanwhile, Lutzig’s confrontations with his boss are perfunctory at best, because Jack Watson’s style of acting is to alternately rattle-through-his-lines-at-breakneck-speed – his answering-the-telephone acting is a masterclass in how not to do it – or to bellow so loudly I swear you can see Madoc’s facial muscles ripple backwards under the onslaught.

After weeks of everyone underplaying, it’s a real shocker to see these two in full flight, and it’s a shame, as Hardy and Madoc…well, you can’t get better than these two, you really can’t.

Lutzig’s smugness is almost his undoing, as Zander loses patience with his methods (having threatened to force Lutzig to torture Gratz as a means of speeding him up, Zander ends up doing the job himself).

While Lutzig soliloquises to himself over a fag break – patting himself on the back before the job’s done – Gratz is taken away and has his fingers broken – all of them. While on the rack, he manages to damn all of German High Command as traitors – even under extreme duress, Gratz just can’t keep his mouth shut.

What follows next is another high point a series that’s composed almost completely of high points. Taken back to his cell, Gratz confronts Lutzig – and the sanity appears to leave Robert Hardy’s eyes completely. He switches characters, seemingly thinking that Lutzig is himself, and he is the interrogator.

Seeing an opportunity, Lutzig takes on the persona of Gratz and waits to see what happens. All of Gratz’s insecurities and thoughts about himself, about Nina, about his conduct and place in the war come tumbling out, as Gratz lays it his soul completely bare – all the while attempting to take repeated swipes at Lutzig’s head with his mutilated hands.

It’s electrifying, as Lutzig gently takes Gratz through this “confession”, admitting in character to anything Gratz wants him to, leading him through the labyrinth until everything’s out in the open and Gratz kneels at his side, a shattered husk.

Seemingly satisfied, Lutzig sits back… at which point, the spark appears to reignite in Gratz’s eyes and he switches personal pronouns and becomes himself again – revealing himself to be far more in control of events than you might think.

Even now, I’m still unsure as to whether Gratz’s sanity does actually desert him here – my initial reading was that this is the only way his mind can achieve a kind of stability after what he’s been through.

By detaching itself completely and allowing Gratz to completely humiliate himself and lay his innermost self open, it’s as if he brings himself back from the edge of insanity. Now, I’m not altogether sure that Gratz hasn’t been in there all along – still the master game player, even at this point. Whichever it is, the end result is the same – Lutzig and Gratz seal one final bargain and are now propelled into one last final search for Vincent, Jimmy and Nina.

The second part of Little Man, What Next? brings everyone together. The plotlines which have been working away for the previous twenty four weeks converge, and everyone gets the chance to shine.

With one exception.

It became obvious some weeks back the writers have run out of things for Jimmy to do, and poor old Alfred Lynch’s main plotline is more or less forgotten about as things begin to shudder to an ending. He will remain very much involved from this point on, but we never find out about his remaining time in the factory with Tony Beckley.

All of a sudden, he’s just there, as if he’s never been away. He remains sitting in the background dispensing quips and doing any legwork that’s necessary to keep the main focus of the episode on the big confrontation that’s been building up for weeks.

This is the episode where Gratz and Vincent finally come face to face, and it doesn’t disappoint. The man with bandaged hands meets the man with bandaged hands and it’s obvious that these two are closer than they’d like to admit – both determined to follow their own course, both mutilated by the SS… and both in love with the same woman.

Shame that woman is Nina, really. It’s a shame that in a series which is blessed with two very strong, very likeable female characters (Adelaide and Francine) and many other powerful supporting turns, that Nina’s the dominant one.

I wish, I really wish, that I could find a spark of sympathy for her. Unfortunately, her character is almost totally without redeeming features. Selfish, devious, manipulative, a ruthless streak a mile wide and a total indifference to anything that doesn’t directly involve Nina, there have been moments in this series where I’ve wondered if Vincent wasn’t right on the money with his initial analysis of the situation.

Maybe they’d all have been better off shooting her in episode one, especially given the swathe of destruction she leaves behind. I’d feel a lot better about her if she showed any sign of remorse – but there’s nothing. Not one jot. Which makes what happens all the harder to take.

Gratz appears to be back to his old tricks, playing both ends against the middle and somehow ends up in the lion’s den. Having endured a remarkable first confrontation that ends up with Vincent hammering his broken fingers and triggering off a hallucination that ends with Nina breaking his fingers all over again (fingers, yes – but it’s the lower part of the anatomy that she removes completely and throws away), Gratz comes to and finds himself surrounded by Vincent, Jimmy and Typhoid Mary.

Even when he’s utterly helpless, he radiates confidence and is soon back on top, negotiating a route back to England for the terrible trio – and leaving a possible escape route out of the war for himself (I’ve never, ever been able to understand Gratz’s motivation, and I feel it’s hampered my understanding of Manhunt somewhat – even at this late stage, I can’t read him. Not one bit. I can only assume that many of his actions are coloured by some lingering sense of affection for Nina, even long after she’s made it plain that its not reciprocated).

In the course of setting this up, he attempts to lead Lutzig away from the trail – and instead, leads him straight to Nina and Jimmy, who have gone to Adelaide for help. This leads to a hold-your-breath moment – with Lutzig talking to Adelaide in the living room, Gratz goes prowling, and stumbles on Nina and Jimmy, hiding in the bathroom.

Will he give them away? It’s touch and go for a moment, but all roads eventually lead back to the safehouse that’s acting as temporary HQ, and a touching reunion for Nina and Vincent.

Jimmy’s been sent off to play marbles for a few moments, which gives our male and female leads the chance to finally declare their feelings properly. The scales fall from Nina’s eyes at last. They greet each other as if it’s the first time they’ve ever met (“Hello, Nina”. “Hello, Vincent”).

Everything seems set for a happy ending, but all is not as it seems, for Vincent’s seen his future, and there isn’t much of it. He sends Nina out to join Jimmy, and the stage is set for one final confrontation.

I truly believe that if Gratz hadn’t overheard Nina and Vincent’s final declaration of devotion, there’d have been a chance for Vincent to survive. I also believe that Vincent knew that, from the moment the words left his mouth.

Unfortunately, Gratz is the sort of man who can’t stand the idea that the other man wouldn’t be as miserable as he was (believe me, he would have been. Give it a few weeks, and Vincent would be clawing at the walls to get out).

In the end, only one person can walk out of that room, and Gratz shoots Vincent in the midst of yet another dirty, vicious scuffle. I’d love to tell you what happens immediately after that, but there was something in my eye that was obscuring my vision.

Vincent became a character I absolutely fell for. Confused, yes. Inclined to rash action, certainly. But possessed of a nobility, a strong moral centre and a vulnerability that couldn’t help but get you on his side. He – and at this point I’ll repeat the spoiler warning at the start of this piece if you don’t want to know what happens next, you have been warned – dies in the end, for a love that was never meant to be in the first place, and he never even knows if it was worth it.

As a result, Jimmy gets the single finest line in the entire 26 episodes, as outside in the car a gunshot is heard. Nina immediately flies off the handle, despite not knowing who’s been shot and who’s survived. She struggles to get out of the car and go back in, and with the elan that Jimmy has displayed throughout the series, he smacks her one and knocks her out. “Whichever one it was, you were the one who pulled the trigger”, he mutters as he drives off with an unconscious Nina beside him. Amen to that, Jimmy boy. Amen to that.

And so, we reach the series conclusion. The episode title should give a few pointers to the content. Exactly six months after we first met them, The Losers finds Nina and Jimmy making for the coast one last time. Lutzig’s hot on their tail, and it really does seem to be the end. Or is it?

There’s one last roll of the dice. The head of the Paris Resistance turns up again – Raoul, which means that we are able to welcome back John Savident and his own peculiar brand of gravitas to Manhunt. Also back for a final lap of honour is Stefan, the serving boy in the restaurant used by the resistance. He’s provided memorable support for everyone else over 26 episodes, so it seems only right to credit Christian Rodska for his sterling work.

With these two on their side, surely things will finally start to go right?

Don’t you believe it. The final episode builds into a convoluted chase involving the gang masquerading as a wedding party (Jimmy looking fearfully uncomfortable in a penguin suit, Nina looking altogether too happy to be in a wedding dress), several roadblocks and an eventual rendezvous at the Coast.

Yes, they finally make it. No, it doesn’t end well.

Their boat awaits, and all seems to be running smoothly – in one final terrible twist of the knife, it’s an ambush. Nina and Jimmy get away. Raoul and Stefan are gunned down, running interference. Adelaide makes a run for the getaway boat, and almost makes it, but is shot in the back and collapses onto the beach. And we fade to black.

The next morning, Lutzig can be seen turning over corpses on the beach, including Adelaide. His lover, lest we forget. It’s an awful way for someone so full of life to breath her last, but that’s Manhunt.

Back in the early part of the Season, Nina tells Vincent the story of the Frog and The Scorpion, which at the time seems a clear warning from her to Vincent about her own nature. It can just as easily be applied to these two – he may have been fond of her, but in the final analysis Lutzig’s a killer and Adelaide… is just another body.

Later, back in England. Nina finally finishes her debriefing. After six months of death and horror, she’s finally made it, and is free to deliver her vital information. But in six months, the war has moved on. People die, faces change. And she’s been carrying round a head full of useless information. It’s all been for nothing. She steps out into the street, ready for her new life.

Meanwhile, Jimmy’s in the pub. At long last free to grow his moustache again, he’s holding forth. Promoted upwards to a cushy deskjob which he doesn’t actually want, he’s not happy. Neither are any of the chaps he’s with, all of whom appear bored rigid by him and desperate to get away.

At least one of them should listen more closely. Jimmy’s friend Eddie is played by a certain Mr Paul Darrow. As a man who will shortly become famous playing a character intimately familiar with the phrase “pointless sacrifice”, old Avon could have gained some valuable pointers.

Nina walks in, and there’s a final twist of the knife. Despite all that they’ve gone through together, she snubs Jimmy, striking up conversation with a handsome American airman. The only reason they know each other at all is because of a chance encounter in France and for Nina, that’s not enough. They part coldly, strangers once more.

And then, with a final flourish of Beethoven on the credits, it’s all over. Vincent, Adelaide, Raoul, Stefan, Anton, Allard and a cast of hundreds of extras are all dead. Lutzig continues in the SS, Gratz is free to start a new life (may he rejoin Sarah again, that couple deserve each other, if only to protect anyone else from getting emotionally entangled). It’s all been for nothing.

But it’s not as simple as that. If nothing else, Manhunt shows you the nobility of the poor sods who struggled against overwhelming odds in World War II. It shows you the little victories. It confronts you with difficult dilemmas, and then doesn’t provide you with a pat answer or a quick resolution.

Most of all though, it shows you just what can be achieved with a dedicated production team, and a cast of quite brilliant actors, giving their all in the name of a series that they quite obviously care about.

Is this the finest show that ITV have ever produced? I think it might very well be. Right now, it stands as a massive tribute to the talents of all concerned. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Go buy. Watch. Fall in love.

But prepare to have your heart broken.

Review – Manhunt Part 3

Onward, with part 3 of my overview of “Manhunt”, courtesy of Jon Melville at Adventures in Primetime.

Warning – spoilers ahoy! It’s going to prove impossible to discuss these episodes without letting things slip, so…you have been warned!

Into the second half of the series we go, and things aren’t exactly looking positive for our jolly band of regulars. With Nina sleeping with the enemy, Jimmy having alienated his one ally in the resistance by refusing to leave France when he’s told to and Vincent in the hands of the SS – it’s difficult to see how any of this is going to end well.

By this point the weekly grind of the production schedule must have been exhausting. Splitting things off into different plot threads makes sense. It also enables the writers to make good use of their magnificent range of guest actors.

Although Lynch, Barkworth and Hayman are more than capable of carrying things on their own, adding Robert Hardy, Philip Madoc, George Sewell and many others makes this series an actor-spotters treasure house.

If you’re reading this, I suspect you’re more than familiar with the pleasure of seeing a familiar actor pop up when you weren’t expecting them. This series is full of such moments, even down to the spit-and-a-cough parts.

Case in point – episodes 15 and 16, Little Man, Big Gun. Manhunt’s first official two parter, although earlier on Only The Dead Survive and What Did You Do In The War, Daddy? formed a self-contained storyline within the overall narrative. The experiment worked then – god, how it worked – and it obviously gave them the confidence to try another longer story because here the plot really has room to breathe.

This is a Nina showcase, pretty much. Our “heroine” continues to be consistently inconsistent. One week she’s a mewling ball of tears, the next, icy cold reserve. The next week again she’ll be taking the difficult decisions and showing steel beneath the exterior, after that she’s making herself the centre of attention and usurping plotlines in a manner which makes you wish she’d just get the hell out of the series and let everybody else get on with it.

It’s a shame because none of this is Cyd Hayman’s fault – she’s never less than rock solid in every episode but it’s obvious that the writers don’t know what to do with the character.

I wonder if it’s the result of the series getting unexpectedly extended? A victim of its own success, suddenly having to stretch to 26 episodes at short notice must have set everyone on the back foot.

This two parter is written by Vincent Tilsley – previously responsible for With A Sort of Love. Tilsley wrote the wonderfully strange version of Sweeney Todd from Mystery and Imagination (out shortly on DVD, and worth it for this episode alone, believe me). Tilsley also turned in two episodes of The Prisoner (The Chimes of Big Ben and Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling) amongst many other gems and he obviously has a flair for getting under the skin of his characters – he loves to put ‘em in an enclosed space, turn them loose on each other and see what happens.

So it proves here as with the exception of a couple of stock heavy soldier types, Gratz’s boss and a blisteringly insane SS Officer character, the only people in this are Cyd Hayman, Robert Hardy and… drum roll please… Ian McCulloch.

I last saw Mac poking someone’s eye out in a series stealing cameo on Colditz, a couple of years before, he was in this, as daring British Communications Officer Captain David Mainwaring, fresh from a swim in the English Channel. If only they’d given him a different surname.

Although, having that said, Arthur Lowe might have made a better fist of the situation than Mac’s character does. Before the first part’s music has even faded, Gratz has nabbed his prey and it looks like we’re in for another reprise of his famed interrogation technique, only with Mainwaring instead of Nina.

Incidentally, at this point Gratz makes reference to Mainwaring “spending a night under the English Channel” – followers of Ian McCulloch’s work will know this is not a situation he’s unfamiliar with.

Events soon shift to a charming domestic scene between Nina and Gratz which demonstrates Nina’s unique ability to turn the simple act of making of a cup of tea into a full-scale cinemascope shouting match, then turn on a sixpence into Little Miss Compliant. Woman’s a suitable case for treatment, I’m telling you.

Then again, so is Mainwaring. Somehow Gratz manages to break him down within minutes and turn him into a willing conspirator in a plot so twisted, so arcane that I couldn’t even tell you the details. Nina’s involved though, as are her uniquely Rose Tyler abilities to make evewy man she meets faw in wuv wiv her has him as putty in her paws. Within an hour of meeting, they’re in bed together. All part of Gratz’s plan, but what that plan actually is… I have no idea. Not one clue.

Before too much longer, Mac has promised to take Nina back to England with him (wherein she’ll presumably be put on show in a cage somewhere). Shortly after that, the loony SS officer attempts to persuade Gratz to join an exciting new cult of genetically perfect supermen – sorry, but I’m not buying it – Robert Hardy’s wearing specs for a start so there’s an obvious genetic weakness right there.

Like Peter Jeffrey as the leader of a flotilla of gorgeous specimens in Adam Adamant Lives! – Beauty is an Ugly Word – there’s a significant discrepancy between what’s being said and what’s on screen. But then, our loony is way off the chart anyway, to the point where even Gratz has to admit to being in the presence of a brain more twisted than his.

Before you know it, Gratz – while actually under house arrest – manages to twist things around so that Mac has to shoot Nina. An altruistic act, which he actually tries to do. Only he’s using an empty gun, thanks to Gratz being several steps ahead as usual. In an ugly, nasty scuffle, it falls to Nina to make her choice between her two potential “saviours”, and it’s Mac who falls, with a knife in his back. Nina has made her choice, but it comes with a price – thanks to some adroit maneuvering from Gratz, she now can’t even leave the house without being watched and is more of a prisoner than ever.

I expected the animated prison bars to come crashing in on a zoom of her face at the end of the episode.

But what of Jimmy? Glad you asked. He has problems of his own as he ends up (as seemingly, everyone does) back in the orbit of Planet Adelaide. Having resolved on Vincent’s behalf to try and rescue Nina (and boy, does that girl need rescuing), he’s back with her little band of strolling vagabonds. But not for long, as here comes another heavy-hitter to join the cast. Can it be Tony Beckley?

Yes, it can. Looking like death warmed up as usual (shame Mac wasn’t still in the cast, he’s good with Zombies), his character of Hochler is a tough nut to crack. Within seconds of meeting him Jimmy’s been arrested for a lack of identification papers (despite a bravura attempt by Adelaide to pass him off as her cousin). Set to work in a local factory Jimmy soon realises that there’s research afoot and with an unerring eye for the safe route and the safety of those around him soon manages to get several of his colleagues massacred. Hochler’s way of dealing with a disturbance is to gun ‘em down – not something Jimmy had counted on, and something which immediately makes him target no.1 for the resistance.

I can’t honestly blame them, especially when Hochler appears to take a shine to Jimmy and takes him on board as ship’s cook and porcupine. Not something guaranteed to make our boy popular with his colleagues, so he’s dispatched to accommodation off-site.

Thankfully, Jimmy manages to make good on his suspicions, as he discovers that there’s a brand new type of jet engine being created from a special type of metal – something which could win the war for Germany. It’s this news that keeps him alive as it’s far too important for the allies not to be told. As man on the spot, presumably it’s only his super-specialist RAF knowledge that’s keeping him alive – reluctantly the resistance bend their efforts to helping him get the knowledge out – and more importantly for what’s to come, a sample of the metal as well.

As is the way of Manhunt, more innocents are destroyed in Jimmy’s wake as his housemate – a Polish chap with but one ambition, to get back home on his bike no matter how long it takes – suddenly finds himself reaching Poland by rather more direct means.

Hochler is the nearest thing to an all-out villain that Manhunt has, and what happens to this simple, innocent little man – while understated – is horrible. All the information you need to work out his eventual fate is given to you. It’s only when you connect the dots that you realise how nasty a character Hochler is.

Meanwhile, back in Ninaworld (it’s a horrible place to visit, and you certainly don’t want to live there), an attempt is made to put Nina in touch with Jimmy via Adelaide. Unfortunately it all goes horribly, spectacularly wrong – more deaths including an atrocity in a church, and the girls end up in the hands of an interrogation squad in another one of Manhunt’s tight little closed-room episodes, “Confessional”.  Or do they?

This is Maggie Fitzgibbon’s finest hour to date. Even under interrogation she refuses to crack, defiant to the bitter end as the shadowy menacing figure of Anton – Brian Cox, here we go again – attempts to break her by more direct means than those employed by Gratz. She’s superb.

There’s a moment midway through the episode where you can see on her face that she realises just where her over-confident playing both ends against the middle has got her. You also see that she’s not going to let that stop her. She’s going to get out of this, one way or another. And she’s not going to change her ways either. Unsurprisingly, when Nina’s put in the chair she instantly betrays Adelaide (to be fair, there’s a blowtorch being waved in her face, and given that her hair is a lacquer sculpture that should have a fire brigade standing by at all times it’s no wonder she freaks instantly).

Astonishingly though, this does not immediately provoke a kicking for Nina – instead she brings out the mother hen in Adelaide. What is it with this girl? And can we bottle it? We’d make a fortune.

It’s somewhere around about this point that Herr Cox reveals himself to be Msieur Cox – he’s working for the resistance and this has been one of leader Allard’s little set pieces to test the strength of his subjects.

Previous set pieces have involved little Nerys Hughes being beaten to within an inch of her life – it’s a dangerous job, working for George Sewell. Since we already know that Nina will buckle like a belt at the merest provocation, we’re left wondering just what the point of the episode is, but it does introduce Cox and adds depth to Adelaide that reveals just how strong she is behind the Lili Von Schtup-isms.

It’s shortly after this that Nina decides it’s time to take several leaves out of Gratz’s book. Degrade and Conquer shows that while she’s learnt at the feet of the master, she’s got a long way to go. There are scenes in this where Nina places an innocent young German soldier in compromising circumstances and I’m in no way convinced. Once again her character switches from gibbering maniac to ice-cold manipulator and it jars far too much. I don’t for one minute think that Nina’s capable of carrying out her plan. Sure enough, she isn’t. Before the episode’s out, it all collapses around her and there she goes – on the run again, only this time there’s no-one to pick her up when she falls.

Gratz meanwhile, suffers the ultimate indignity for a man of his temperament, as one of his twisted schemes goes seriously awry. Attempting to make a young woman crack by denying her even the most basic of dignities – no washing facilities, no bathroom, forced to live in her own filth for weeks on end while within sight of someone who enjoys every possible luxury – he’s stunned when the tables are turned, the young woman emerges the victor and comprehensively trounces him at his own game. The experience seems to prove too much for him, and he’s left close to snapping.

Someone’s missing. Where has Vincent gone? Ah, here he is. After a four episode break Peter Barkworth returns – and Philip Madoc’s got him.

It’s a joy to have Barkworth back – without him, the series has seemed a little unbalanced, losing focus slightly as it sets up the three parallel storylines. Focus is definitely regained here as the plot shifts to accommodate him and eventually brings him back into contact with the others. But first, he has to undergo everything the SS can throw at him. Which is an awful lot.

When we first see him, he’s in tatters, blood streaming from his hands and about to be executed, but it’s all a bluff to break him. Needless to say, it’s merely the first stage in an ongoing cat and mouse game between a remarkably Welsh sounding German and a very English sounding Frenchman. Another one of Vincent’s old mates turns up too. A lot of this one is devoted to a two-hander between Vincent and his friend, Egon. Unfortunately, while Barkworth is his usual scintillating self, James Maxwell’s performance lacks an essential spark. These scenes should fly. They merely saunter along, taking in occasional points of interest along the way, and that’s a shame. Maxwell seems terribly under rehearsed somehow. Another few takes could have saved it, but it’s not to be.

James Maxwell’s spirit haunts the Manchester’s Royal Exchange Theatre, y’know. Yes, it does. “Most Haunted” says so. Are you going to argue with Yvette Fielding?

Vincent has previously confessed to being terrified of the prospect of torture – this episode reveals that he is far, far stronger than he thinks he is. He not only endures everything, he emerges the other side somehow tempered.

The old, nervous, twitchy Vincent disappears from here on in, to be replaced by a quiet, dignified, almost stately figure in a very very natty suit. From this point in he even wields a machine gun with elan, something the old man would never do. He also takes an active part in planning events, in driving things forward. No longer the victim, he’s won more of a victory than I think he realises. He manages to outsmart The Madoc for a start. At least, he seems to. I still think there’s more to this particular plot. I don’t think Lutzig’s done with Vincent yet but for now, Vincent heads back for a reunion with Jimmy.

Which brings me to Intent To Steal. Up until the series’ release on DVD, this was the only episode I’d seen and it left me horribly confused. I now realise that it’s massively uncharacteristic of the series as a whole. It’s effectively one huge experiment, for reasons unknown.

I can’t work out if it’s a budgetary thing, an artistic thing or merely the practicalities of getting the whole episode down in a normal production schedule, but the whole episode… is silent. Not one word of dialogue uttered from first credit to final caption. Given that one of Manhunt’s most obvious characteristics is a refusal on the part of almost everyone involved to shut up, this is remarkable. What’s even more remarkable is that the production values on this are huge. Money’s been hurled at this like nobody’s business.

Reams of location footage. Acres of extras. Massive explosions, rounds of ammunition being discharged in all directions. No wonder I thought it was an action adventure series in the ITC mould. It’s totally misleading. It’s also quite superb. The culmination of the Jimmy-and-the-Jet-Engine subplot, it’s a fifty minute heist caper, as Barkworth, Lynch, Fitzgibbon, Cox and Sewell plus several dozen resistance fighters combine to attempt to steal a sample of secret metal from the factory.

Not everyone’s going to walk away from this one and so it proves. George Sewell’s Allard is maimed by a guard dog (well, I say maimed – it’s traditional in British drama for savage dogs to be loveable old wuffers with a few growling noises dubbed on and Manhunt doesn’t buck the trend), before buying it in the big end-of-episode explosion. The same explosion also does for Brian Cox’s character – Anton’s back broken on a pile of rubble, it’s an undignified way for one of the series’ strongest characters to go out – but perfectly in keeping with the scuffling, unglamorous way this particular war is being conducted.

By the time the credits roll everyone on the resistance side is dead, apart from Jimmy and Vincent. I may be reading far too much into this, but there’s a very strong sense of the ho-yay in this one as well as there are several moments when the boys appear to be about to steal a kiss with each other in the midst of the mayhem.

At the end of the episode, there they sit – crouched in the rubble and corpses. They’ve achieved their aim of stealing a sample of the metal. But is the cost too high?

Indeed, the strain is telling on all of our series regulars by this point. Jimmy and Vincent sit hand in hand in no man’s land. Gratz shows dangerous signs of insanity. Nina’s out there, live without a safety net. Allard and Anton are dead. Only Adelaide looks like getting out of this alive, and she’s a wild card anyway. Goodness knows who she’s going to side with.

Lutzig? Well, he’s not finished yet, not by a long way, but he’s in better shape than any of the rest of them.

As someone once said, who will survive, and what will be left of them?

The final four episodes await.

Onward to Part 4

Review – Manhunt Part 2

Part two of my somewhat epic review of Manhunt, by kind permission of Jon Melville at Adventures in Primetime.

Right, here we go again! I seem to be watching this series in batches of seven episodes, which makes for neatness if nothing else.

Doing so makes plain some alarming leaps about in continuity, with one major cliffhanger glossed over the next week, and some chopping and changes in characters. Rather wonderfully, the opening titles change to reflect this, so you can play a little guessing game as to which character is going to turn up this week.

Dealing with the age old problem of who-gets-top-billing? Lynch and Barkworth’s credits swap over each week more or less from this point, with each being credited first on every-other episode. Cunning, although I’d hate to think there was any backstage rivalry between those two – the chemistry onscreen is just so strong.

Following his introduction in episode nine, Robert Hardy gets two credits – initially a title card reading “As Gratz”, followed by his name emblazoned in white-on-red glory on a second card. Presumably this is to reflect the absolutely bloody seismic effect his appearance has on the series.

The initial chase, evade capture, chase a bit more format of the earliest episodes gives way to something altogether darker, more disturbing and even more intriguing than the show’s already been.

Before all that though, at least one of our intrepid heroes has some difficult questions to face as we career into episode eight – A Different Kind of War. This – unbelievably enough – is what passes for a Christmas episode in Manhunt, as Jimmy, Nina and Vincent pitch up at the house of one of Vincent’s oldest friends on Christmas Eve.

Greeted with suspicion at first by the female occupant of the house, Vincent’s name produces a surprising warmth and affection, before the introduction of Vincent’s old friend following a delayed build-up.

And no wonder, because no British drama series is complete without an appearance by good old Julian Glover, as “Paul”. Bristling with Bonhomie, hospitable to a fault, and guaranteeing a safe haven for our fugitives, Paul seems the perfect host, but before Christmas Eve is out, we’ll discover a very different man behind the facade.

This one’s a tension-builder, as first Nina, then Jimmy discover darker sides to the perfect couple they’ve landed up with. Before too long, Vincent is forced to confront his younger self and the political ideals he once held dear, and to ask himself – how far will I go to protect that for which I now stand?

Jimmy shines in this one – although events are initially set in motion by Nina, it’s Jimmy who’s the motor and Alfred Lynch… well, he walks off with the episode in his pocket. There’s a lengthy “seduction” scene – quote marks wholly appropriate, believe me – where I honestly didn’t know how Jimmy was going to react. His character, while seeming to be all gloss and gung-ho, might well be the darkest of the three.

Certainly this episode reveals a ruthless quality to him that he hasn’t really shown before. While Vincent sometimes appears to be driven entirely by his reaction to what’s happening around him, and while Nina at this point is almost totally passive, being buffeted from scene to scene with no real control over her fate (the credits even refer to her as “a parcel”), it’s Jimmy who directs things totally here.

Vincent is brought face-to-face with some dark and unpleasant truths about his old friend, himself, and eventually the cause he’s fighting for.

And then… nope, not telling you. Watch it and find out for yourself, because it’s a key event that flavours everything to come. The final scene is simple, underplayed, and totally affecting.

Episode nine brings the return of an SS uniformed Philip Madoc as Lutzig. This time, however, he has a thorn in his side. A Robert Hardy shaped thorn in his side, as Abwehr Sergeant Gratz  – self-educated, self-important – saunters in and within ten minutes achieves the impossible, making The Madoc look discomfited.

Every scene he’s in is a constant flow of erudition, verbosity, and charm which leaves the viewer feeling like a snake staring at a Mongoose. Even before he gives you proof, you can tell this man is dangerous. Following some antics in a factory being used as one end of an escape route, Gratz eventually corners Nina. Not before a rare mis-step on the part of the production team, however.

In an attempt to smuggle themselves into this potential means of escape, Nina is supposed to be part of the male workforce, and has been told to dress like a young boy. The series suddenly lurches towards ‘Allo ‘Allo territory when Nina turns up wearing overalls, no make up and a Balaclava. But still obviously, distinctively female.

My suspension of disbelief needed a considerable helping hand here, especially in the – gasp! – final moments, when Gratz removes her disguise. Honestly couldn’t tell the difference. By this point, the boys have seemingly escaped, leaving Nina in the hands of the enemy – leading to another extraordinary episode (does this series ever have an off-day? Nina’s ridiculous disguise aside, the quality bar is set astonishingly high).

With a Sort of Love is the sort of TV that I live for.  One of those television episodes where you occasionally forget to breathe. Where you find yourself wondering what the hell is going to happen, and loving the fact that you have no idea.

Set predominantly in an interrogation room, a camp-bed and table pretty much the only furniture, Cyd Hayman and Robert Hardy its only occupants, this would make a terribly effective stage play.

It’s certainly one of the bravest episodes of a mainstream drama I’ve seen, taking as its starting point the effect of Stockholm Syndrome on even the bravest of prisoners and applying it to Nina – a character who up to this point (one particular moment aside, as hinted at earlier) – has given us no evidence to suggest that she is capable of withstanding a sustained interrogation.

Robert Hardy’s performance in this is a masterclass, and Cyd’s not far behind him.

Beginning on a very quiet, very restrained pitch (virtually the first scene has Gratz ordering Nina to strip naked in front of him – which she does), Hardy becomes a dervish as he puts Nina through the most concentrated form of mental torture, prying at every opening in her defences, causing her to question her identity, her sense of self-worth, her belief in herself as a human being… extraordinary.

At one point, he commences a grotesque mime of a Hitlerian Ventriloquist’s dummy that’s so inappropriate to the surroundings that you find yourself laughing. So does Nina, almost involuntarily – and he’s on her – smashing her repeatedly across the face, throwing her across the table, screaming at her.

It’s terrifying.

Somehow, she manages to withstand this long enough for Gratz to be seriously compromised by the episode’s B-story involving a plot to assassinate the Fuhrer.

The episode then screeches sharply round an unexpected plot twist, which again I’m not going to reveal, but about which I will say – Nina reveals an astonishing strength of character in going down a route which might just provide her with the only possible glimmer of safety she can possibly know.

But it’s a harsh decision, a pragmatic one – and it’s one which left this viewer with a feeling of almost total distaste and contempt for her. And that’s despite her heartbreaking vulnerability in the scenes immediately preceding it.

Unfortunately, these final scenes (which, incidentally, feature the only appearance of  Jimmy and Vincent in the episode – that’s two out of the three leads absent for an entire show, which gives Cyd Hayman room to show what she’s really capable of) lead into a cliffhanger  which is so vigorously unresolved in the next episode that I found myself checking to make sure I hadn’t skipped one or two in the running order.

But no – the shattering events are merely alluded to in passing, which is disappointing and makes me suspect that there may have been a midnight-hour scripting crisis.

Which leads us into the next phase of the series.

Jimmy and Vincent find themselves in the employ of a touring chanteuse – a blowsy, middle-aged diva of a woman called Adelaide. Suspected by the resistance of passing secrets to the SS, Adelaide is in fact in it for whatever she can get. She’ll sell in either direction if there’s a profit in it for her.

Vincent ends up as the piano player, earning a grudging respect from Adelaide,  Jimmy (getting the fuzzy end of the lollipop yet again) ends up having to push a bucket around and pretend to be the World War II equivalent of Benny from Crossroads. And being referred to as “Halfwit” by Adelaide.

Nina? The results of her experiences in previous episodes still reverberate, and following brief employment as a serving girl in the same nightclub the boys are working in (and let it be known that both Lutzig and Gratz patronise this place and never realise – at least at this point – that Jimmy and Vincent are The Droids They’re Looking For), she ends up heading off for an appointment with Gratz. Her jailor, her torturer, her nemesis.

It’s at this point that poor old Vincent confesses his love for Nina – and matters complicate even further…

Meanwhile, Adelaide continues to bewilder and confuse, while dragging all within her orbit into her strange, slightly quizzical world. Played by The Newcomers’ Maggie Fitzgibbon with her Australian accent in full flight, Adelaide resembles a galleon in full sail in some episodes. No wonder Lutzig – who she’s supposed to be dating – looks faintly haunted everytime they’re on screen together.

Jimmy acquires an ally in young Francine, an extremely capable young blonde French waitress. An extremely capable young blonde waitress… played by the extremely capable young brunette Welsh Nerys Hughes. Not that you’d know it. A spot on accent and an ability to submerge herself in the role mean that two episodes went by before I even spotted her name on the credits. Impressive.

Beaten to within an inch of her life for suspected “collaboration” with the enemy, stuck with one of Petain’s breed of obnoxious brats in short trousers and even smaller brains for a brother and forced into a life of unbelievable danger as she attempts to act as go-between for the resistance (the representative of this branch being George Sewell. Christ, I’m surprised Germany didn’t lie down and surrender immediately), Francine looks at the currents swirling around her, and dives straight in, saving Jimmy from a situation which almost claims both him and Vincent.

Caught in a siege situation with the enemy closing in, Vincent pulls rank on Jimmy, ordering to shoot him that he not be captured and tortured.

Showing the combination of raw nerve, common sense and competence that marks him out as a prime asset of the RAF, Jimmy botches it, delivering a badly injured Vincent into the hands of the SS.

With Nina already in a situation that could have fatal consequences for more than just her, Vincent in the stronghold of the enemy (with none but The Madoc for company) and Jimmy adrift, attempting to save “The Girl” – it looks bleak for our heroes at the halfway mark.

What’s next? See me in seven episodes time…

Part 3? Onward!

Review – Manhunt Part 1

Quite some time ago, I was asked by the estimable Jon Melville of Adventures in Primetime to pen a review of the World War II drama serial “Manhunt”. I got somewhat carried away, and ended up doing a four part epic. With Jon’s kind permission, I’m republishing it here. I’m quietly proud of this, purely because one of the writers of “Manhunt” – Vincent Tilsley –  was kind enough to pass generous comment on it. Things like that are why you write. Anyway, here we go – part 1. Hope you like.

Strange thing, the way television gets remembered. It seems almost random sometimes. A handful of series get chosen for posterity, and repeated into oblivion while others, despite their own merits, languish after their initial broadcast, watched by millions but remembered by a few.

There are any number of shows that deserve another airing, to be enjoyed all over again. I’m slightly Reithian in my view of television and radio – sometimes, people don’t know that they want something. But if they get the chance to sample it, they’ll find that they do. So don’t give ‘em what they want, give ‘em what they don’t know they want yet as well.

If only there was some sort of durable, mass-produced, commercially viable format onto which these series could be placed, and unleashed upon a hungry public!

Hello then to Network and their marvellously eclectic collection of DVD releases.

Network has probably attacked my credit card more often than any other company. Every new release seems to bring even more television arcana shuffling back into the light, blinking sleepily and ready to be enjoyed again. I’ve lost count of the number of shows I’ve discovered, rediscovered or simply caught up with thanks to them. Not all of them have been undiscovered gems, but most of them have had something to recommend them.

Occasionally, they’ve been so good, so heartstoppingly compulsive that it beggars belief that they’ve slipped from the public consciousness so completely. ITV drama, especially – the thing that ITV were always fantastic at was that particular strand of drama that everybody watched. Your Sherlock Holmes’s, your Brideshead’s.

But for every series that sticks in the mind, there’s one that wiped the floor with the opposition and then disappeared.

Public Eye, for example, effortlessly brilliant for nearly ten years, top of the ratings or thereabouts every season. Now, apart from a repeat of the colour seasons back at the dawn of UK Gold, it’s only thanks to the DVDs that anyone’s had the chance to appreciate it at all.

Which brings me to Manhunt.  Made in 1969 for LWT, and broadcast from January of the following year, to the best of my knowledge it’s only had a single repeat since when the hugely uncharacteristic episode, Intent To Steal, was aired as part of TV Heaven in the early nineties. Manhunt  was (so I’m told, Frank Muir said so on TV Heaven, and who am I to argue?) compulsive viewing for the entire nation, and yet it disappeared without trace. I’ve spoken to numerous people about it over the last few weeks and without exception the response has been a blank stare and a query of “what’s that? Never heard of it…”

Very little information exists about it on the internet – there are no devoted fansites out there.

No lovingly detailed retrospectives, or interviews with any members of the production who are still with us. This doesn’t seem fair. Hopefully the DVD release will bring it to the attention of a few more people, because – and this is on the evidence of the first seven episodes, which I glutted myself on yesterday – it is absolutely stunning television.

I’m not resorting to hyperbole here. It really is that good. From the first scene, it goes for you and doesn’t let go. So, let’s get the usual clichés out of the way early, shall we? Yes, it’s slow. Yes, it’s very, very talky. That’s television in the early seventies for you. I imagine that thirty years from now, people will be posting reviews of today’s output offering blanket condemnations of the way everything is shot ridiculously fast, with hundreds of shots where they’re not needed, and frenetic running about from scene to scene.

If I ever lose the ability to absorb myself in a drama that relies on the interplay of several superb actors talking to each other and concentrate on how big the effects budget is instead as a mark of quality, I might as well lie down and pull the earth in on myself.

The premise is simple enough. It’s World War II. In occupied Paris, a young woman (real name Anne-Marie, codename Nina, played all-too convincingly by Cyd Hayman – the early episodes feature numerous occasions of the character losing it in pure hysteria and it’s upsetting how well Hayman does it) is assigned to take notes at meetings of the resistance. Nothing goes down in paper, it’s all in her head. Initially somewhat frivolous, the reality of war is brought brutally home to her when a meeting is invaded by German troopers. A massacre ensues: only Nina escapes.

Sometime later, in another part of France, a British plane comes down, depositing one Jimmy Porter into the middle of occupied territory. Jimmy will become one of the series’ central figures, and the series got lucky by casting Alfred Lynch. Sparky, witty, quipping like mad, and with a certain rumpled charm, Lynch is brilliant and incredibly watchable.

It’s a wonderful performance, and it makes me terribly sad to compare Jimmy – full of life, vigorous, agile in both mind and body – to the shattered husk of Commander Millington in 1989’s Doctor Who story The Curse of Fenric. Although both characters are played by the same actor, the passage of nearly twenty years and (one presumes) illness appear to have drawn all the life out of Lynch, and it’s terribly sad.

Although we initially believe that he’s landed up in France by accident, suspicions begin to mount that he is not all he seems, but all that’s to come. Meantime, he makes his way to the school hall in a neighbouring village, there to meet with the nearest resistance cell who will attempt to get him home. Unfortunately, they have other matters occupying them as news reaches them of a hysterical girl, just off the train from Paris and babbling out essential resistance details to anyone who’ll listen.

The girl in question has had the misfortune to arrive at the school hall, and her inability to keep her mouth shut puts the resistance in danger. What to do, what to do? It’s a hard decision: “Vincent” must be called. Vincent is obviously the top man, the one who knows what to do. And it certainly seems to be the case when Vincent arrives, and instructs his colleagues to shoot Nina. Shortly afterwards, Jimmy reveals himself to be present, and Vincent decides to dispense two birds with one stone…

Vincent turns out to be played by one of Britain’s finest actors: Peter Barkworth. In this series there are no heroes or villains, only people. There are good people on the German side, there are complete sods on the resistance side. And squarely in the middle sits Vincent, a fundamentally good man who has to do unpleasant duties in order to fulfil what he sees as his role in the war.

Barkworth brings out every nuance of the conflict within the man, somehow switching back and forth between personable and pleasant to steely-eyed maniac, sometimes within the space of minutes. It’s an astonishing piece of work.

Following an intervention from the town priest (great British thesp Peter Copley) which keeps Jimmy and Nina alive temporarily, and following the receipt of a communiqué from London, Vincent discovers that Nina knows everything about the main resistance movement, but it’s all in her head. She’s essential to the war effort and must be got to London at once.

Meanwhile, Jimmy is revealed to be Vincent’s superior officer, but London want him back too, so he is instructed to place himself under Vincent’s command, and so begins the first phase of the series – a desperate game of hide and seek through occupied France in a desperate attempt to get the fugitives to the coast.

There are moments over the next few episodes which make for uncomfortable viewing.

On being left in the custody of someone who she quite rightly views as a homicidal maniac, Nina makes a break for it. In their attempts to get her back, Vincent and Jimmy encounter all sorts, from a patriotic farmer to members of the Communist resistance. Rape appears to be if not condoned, then at the very least goes unpunished as to stop to save the victim would mean the possibility of losing Nina and thus a vital component of the war effort.

Our “heroes” kill those who get in their way – not with any sense of enjoyment, but because there’s something driving them on to succeed in their goal. Virtually everyone who encounters them in the first seven episodes comes away with their lives blasted to pieces as a result. Farmers lose their livelihoods. Entire communities are evicted by the German army in an attempt to find the fugitives. People die, others will never be the same. And yet somehow, Vincent, Jimmy and Nina contrive to keep you onside – just – because all three are such powerful actors that you’re convinced by them and keep rooting for them even when they’re being unpleasant.

Highlights? Far too many in the first seven episodes to list everything. But I can’t let episodes three and four pass unmentioned, for the simple reason that they are, quite frankly, as good as virtually anything produced by British television in the last fifty years.

Episode three, Only The Dead Survive, is written by Roy Clarke, and it makes me wonder why the man isn’t more famous for his drama work. Episode four, What Did You Do in the War, Daddy?, is an Arden Winch script (who I know primarily for upping the ante considerably on Moonbase III with the wonderful View of a Dead Planet. Shame it was the last episode, really).

Vincent comes up with the clever wheeze of taking refuge on the estate where he grew up, which is currently occupied by a garrison of Nazi troopers. The officer in charge of the garrison has some clearly defined ideas about honour in the army, and thus wishes to know nothing about the more unpleasant side of war. Hiding in plain sight essentially, Vincent reckons without one fairly major flaw in his strategy: the sudden arrival of the SS in the form of Phillip Madoc.

Followers of The Madoc’s work will know that he’s at his absolute best when he’s being icily polite, and so it proves here. He also puts into play that quiet smile which is so much more unnerving than any amount of mad shouting or ranting would be. To give away too much more of the plot would be a crime, but I have to give mention to two standout guest performers – 1990‘s George Murcell as the family retainer, a Corsican who just can’t keep his mouth shut – and Rosalie Crutchley as the housekeeper/governess.

Crutchley plays it like Diana Rigg as Mrs Danvers, until a shocking moment when her reserve goes completely – it’s all the more affecting for her total control in all the preceding scenes.

And this is where Barkworth comes into his own, managing to control the viewers’ emotions.

At the start of episode four he’s so controlling as to be stifling, and you sympathise with Jimmy and Nina, stuck at close quarters with the maniac. Shortly after that, he discovers that his mother – who he’s not allowed to see, given the circumstances – is slowly going senile. The emotions play across his face. He attempts to suppress them all, and sits down to a meagre meal with the other two. “What’s wrong?” Jimmy and Nina ask. And just for a second, as he’s saying grace, Vincent’s control deserts him, and the words come out in a gulping, angry sob before he gains his control again. I wanted to hug him and tell him everything was alright at that point. Even if it patently wasn’t.

If the succeeding episodes don’t quite live up to that high, it’s surely no shame. Nothing really could. But there’s still loads to get your teeth into: a tense chase across country in an attempt to get into free France on One More River, with an ending that’ll leave you feeling like someone’s kicked you in the stomach; the succeeding Open House, the very definition of a bottle show, featuring no-one outside of Lynch, Barkworth and Hayman; and the remarkably odd Better Doubt Than Die, in which events overwhelm Nina and she retreats into a catatonic state.

On being rescued from a seemingly impossible situation by Vincent’s extremely unwilling cousin and passed along to another Cell operating out of a village undertakers, we’re greeted to the some remarkable scenes in which the young, fit and extremely vigorous Jimmy is taken down several dozen physical pegs by the middle aged and extremely short Bernard Hepton and Leslie French.

Hepton in particular is remarkable in these scenes, going from placid politeness to outbursts of extreme violence without any sign of the gears grinding. He obviously acquires a taste for this sort of role, as he crossed the floor (and jumps channels as well) shortly thereafter in order to portray a shades-of-grey German commander for the BBC in Colditz, then heading back to resistance France for several series of Secret Army.

What of Nina? How is she jolted out of her catatonic state? Believe it or not, by the love of a good man. Or at least, the physical benefits of having a good man around. Yes, the way to deal with a trauma so major that the mind of the victim shuts down, is to have vigorous, repeated and presumably spectacular sex with them until they’re all better. Remember, you heard it here first. Even in the middle of this, Jimmy shines – furiously abstaining from the suggestion that he be the one to go upstairs and sort Nina’s problems out by claiming that “the RAF are strictly honourable fornicators!!!”, amongst many other choice splutterings.

And that’s where I’ve got to so far. Honestly, if the rest of the series is this good, it’s in with a shout as ITV’s best ever drama.

Reservations? Very few.

Although Nina is utterly believable at all times, at this point she’s not a likeable character in the slightest. If someone’s going to get into trouble, fall over, twist their ankle or have hysterics, it’s going to be her, and it gets wearing after a time, almost to the point where you wonder if despite the loss of the vital information Vincent might not be better just sticking to his original plan.

Apart from that, perhaps the video look for exteriors isn’t the best idea: a series this classy really deserves to have that lush film look. But as it is, the flat video look coupled with virtually no incidental music at all (what there is comes from series composer, Ludwig Van Beethoven – he’ll go far, that one), means it’s virtually documentary at times.

If that’s all I have to complain about, I’ve got nothing to complain about at all.

Extras on DVD? Perhaps because very few of the main players are still with us (no Barkworth, no Lynch, very few of the production team), there’s no supporting material. No documentary, no interviews. Nothing except a photo gallery. But when a series is this splendid, you don’t need anything extra. Sometimes the content in itself is enough.

So far, unreservedly recommended.

On to part two