The period drama addict.North and South in our eyes

Another great period drama is “North and South” 2004 produced by BBC.This is actually my second favorite drama of all times.
It’s an adaptation of the novel with the same name by Elizabeth Gaskell written in 1855,some 4 decades after Jane Austen wrote P&P.The two books are very much alike because you have the intelligent, educated, witty,outspoken, poor young woman and the rich,proud,handsome man who is inlove with her.He proposes,she refuses and the rest is history.

I’ts soo good I still get the tingles just thinking about this story :).
The problem with the movie is that you know from minute 12 exactly how it’s going to end.However,the wait is worth 4 hours because the actors deliver the story beautifully and the story itself is beautiful.Since we can’t stop saying the word “beautiful” we might as well remind everybody that Richard Armitage is beautiful (and so is Daniela Denby-Ashe but we don’t care for her,we’re girls).
The main line of the plot is P&P much,the two main characters learn to change for each other but there’s much more to the story than that.You can feel the 4 decades difference because in N&S you actually get to the drama while P&P is more of a light comedy.The drama you get is caused by the industrial era,the change of status in the pleabean’s life.The peasant is no longer a peasant but an industrial worker,he is much more poor and he depends not on earth to get food from but on a factory and a master who may not be just.Also,there is danger for the worker in the factory.The potential danger is fire,a constant potential danger,but the greatest danger,the danger the worker feels,is his failing health due to bad working conditions.
So this is not only a love story,it also asks big questions about the condition of the not important people,the people nobody talked about in the mid 19th century.
The story and the characters are believable,you can see the passion,the pain,you really can cut the tension with the knife.There’s death, disease, murder, honor, sacrifice, love, hate, passion,money…it’s a must-see.
I cannot explain how good the movie is,I can just tell you that only the 1995 “Pride and Prejudice” beats it in my charts and mention that it’s one of the very few exceptions of “movie being better than the book”.
Tommy insists we do the thumbs up-down thing,but it’s pointless.We liked everything and disliked nothing except for Margaret’s other suitor(but you have to dislike him,that’s his character).No more spoilers here.
By the way,Tommy is that one–>

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