Starring: Sean Bean, Daragh O'Malley, Hugh Fraser, John Tams, Michael Mears Directed By: Tom Clegg Average Rating: Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1 Audience Rating: Unrated Binding: DVD Format: Box set, Color, DVD-Video, Limited Edition, NTSC Label: Bfs Entertainment Number of Items: 15 Region Code: 1 Release Date: February 14, 2006 Running Time: 1490 minutes Theatrical Release Date: July 01, 2006
By them seperate Great Program...but by buying the three smaller sets plus Sharpe's Challenge seperate....you pay about $70 less. I guess if you think a wooden box and letter opener are worth the extra $ plus remember no Sharpe's Challenge in the complete set...........Amazon really needs to get the sets priced accordingly....doesn't make sense to pay more for less....
American View of British TV-Disturbing War Ethics Story-wise..it's the Peninsular Wars, the British and their Spanish allies are slowly pushing Napoleon back into France. Richard Sharpe is leading a specialist group of sharpshooters, his 'chosen men', thru a series of engagements from episode to episode. Sharpe, himself, has been promoted from the enlisted ranks to the officier corp. Despite the fact that he is an internationally famous war hero, has royal patronage, and is on a name basis with Wellington he must battle discrimination and political jealousy from an aristocratic officier corp. Good so far-nice plot possibilities.
But on the whole the story plots are rather lame, not well thought out, with lots of unresolved loose ends,and plenty of military inaccuracies.I don't how many times Sharpe saved the battle (and the episode) by running head-long into direct cannon fire, taking the hill or fort.....right. In every episode he gets wounded and in too many he still feverishly rises from his bed to lead a running charge (and save the day).In every episode he fights a British officier and fights poorly, takes another wound, then at the last second shows his true martial prowess, defeating his 'brother' officier. On the postive side, I liked his team of 'chosen men'. If you remember the old 'Combat' TV series, these guys are of the same cut,only British/Irish...regular guys doing what has to be done...solid people.
Personally, I thought the Sharpe series was poor (except the last one in India-that's really good).But once I started watching I had to finish. I was strangely hooked. It is oddest window into British moral war ethics.
The series portrays terrible British war crimes, officier corruption of the worst sort, murder and rape of allies,women and children, looting of allied towns, the assassination of a royal ally by a British officier. It's relentless. Virtually every episode has some sort of criminality.
By far the most common plot theme is not fighting the French, but British officier corruption. Enlisted-officier relations are portrayed as dismally awful. Even sargeants and corporals (the classic buffer for bad officiers) are portrayed as criminally brutal and corrupt. The series writers show no reason for loyality to God and King.
The puzzling aspect is, all this criminality is really not part of the main plot. It appears to be there as a side bar to what's playing in the plot. Ex: the British evict the French from a Spanish town, you'd think to liberate their friends and allies. But the Brits enter this town with the intent of rape and plunder.A British sargeant even makes quite a statement before hand about looking forward to raping as many Spanish women as possible. The writers use this pillaging as a backdrop for Sharpe to have a final showdown with a brutal British officier. Every episode my jaw dropped, you have to see for yourself.
That is the truly interesting aspect of the series, the plot moves along and all of a sudden there's a war crime or brutality and then back to plot...it's all entertainment. Can you imagine the HBO series on the American WWII unit- Band of Brothers- portrayed with the rape of French women and wanton officier corruption. Americans would have tarred and feathered HBO. I suppose Brits are different than Americans.
The Sharpe series is definitly worth watching, it's real different than US TV. And with what goes on within, well, you be the judge.
Awful I have enjoyed the Sharpe novels and have read them twice, along with most everything else Bernard Cornwell has written. Therefore I spent over $300 for the DVDs, relying on the opinions offered to Amazon.
I have played three of them and have been very dissapointed. The productions have bastardised the novels. The acting becomes laborious, the plots rediculous,the low-cost production obvious, and most of all boring. I cannot stand to look at the rest of the serious and have not done so.
I will gladly ship the lot off to anyone who will pay the shipping from South Africa. The pewter letter opener broke with the first letter I attempted to open and was trashed, as the whole set should be.
Sharpe's Complete Collection I bought this for my husband for his birthday. He already had all these on VHS but he said that these are edited better and the color and sound are great. If you enjoy historical fiction and you enjoy war movies/shows, you will enjoy these DVDs!
It's a wonderful series! I bought the whole set for my husband several years ago (the price has gone WAY up since then!), and he loved it. We had watched it in three different series (maybe on Masterpiece Theatre?), and we loved it. So when the DVD set came out it made a perfect birthday present (and we watched it all over again)! If you like the historical/period shows (and you know who you are) then you will love this one too. I'd try to get a better price if I were you--$300+ is a bit pricy! Maybe eBay? But the set is great--you won't be disappointed!
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