best movie i've ever seen.

The tone of this movie is interesting -- the stakes are both dramatic and high, but it's balanced with a lot of fun, tongue and cheek dialogue.

Close shines in drama with strong language, adult themes.

A movie that not only functions as a solid scarefest but a razor-sharp satire.

This is not an easy drama to watch....but the rewards make it all worthwhile. Yes, it starts off a bit slow. You have to adjust yourself to the pace and, for lack of a better word, the quietness of the piece. The score is fairly minimal, aside from a few intense strains that play during moments of torment for the main character. And it works perfectly.No one says more than they need to, and the silences enrich the drama. This is a story of people who have secrets, who struggle to express themselves and communicate. There is no unneeded expository dialogue; it trusts the viewers to pay attention. And the visual setting, the performances, the story are so riveting that you can't stop paying attention.The acting is consistently wonderful. I agree with another reviewer who said it took some adjusting to MacKay as Older Lewis and JBF as Alice, but I can't fault either of them for that. Alice almost dropped out of the sky (one reviewer said it was like Gilbert had ordered her from Harrods, LOL), so it made sense that she seemed awkward at first. And MacKay is not only much older than Finn Elliot but does not particularly resemble him. So to me, that was more a matter of how they were introduced than of the acting.MacKay is quite brilliant, and I was very impressed with Greg Wise. The secondary characters are seamless and strong. Jessica Bardem is thoroughly winning. And JBF really hit her stride in the scene in the restaurant with Young Lewis (around the middle of the first episode) and never broke it after that. Alice became a compelling character in what is, IMO, her best performance to date. Granted I have not seen everything she's done, but this was a great showcase for her talent and I think she is growing exponentially as an actress.When it came to and end I felt like I had just watched a classic. In retrospect the entire story became an almost perfect whole and it stayed with me. I watched it again and enjoyed it even more the second time. Haunting, beautiful, bittersweet. Just a wonderful series.

With some great talent and such an interesting story this had a lot of potential to be good, even great. And all the high anticipation was not quashed, with a very good first episode, with a couple of reservations, and an outstanding second one. Don't let the constant gloom put you off, this was a powerful and poignant story done rivetingly by the BBC.The Outcast looks great for starters, with the post-war period detail done to very elegant and atmospheric effect and the whole drama being beautifully photographed throughout. Loved also the haunting and carefully chosen music scoring (no shrill violins for example) that gave off a real sense of melancholy while allowing the drama to resonate and not overbear it, as well as how appropriately restrained the direction was. The script is intelligently structured, thoughtful and affecting, it doesn't rely too much on over-exposition, the mood is not too one-dimensional (thanks to a reasonably but subtly upbeat first twenty minutes or so) and there is very little misplaced to interrupt the flow (apart from the slightly misplaced sex scene in the bar). The story, while deliberately but seldom dully paced, is incredibly powerful in its best parts and has a great deal of poignancy and nuance, particularly memorable was the truly harrowing drowning scene and the contrast between the torment and secret pain and the civilised and restrained society was depicted powerfully and without any compromises too.As for the cast, the performances are uniformly impressive, with seemingly clichéd characters to begin with but ones that show more dimension and meat in the second half. There were two performances that left me with reservations at first but once the material got meatier and the characters more interesting in the second half their performances got far better. George McKay seemed rather vacant and gormless at first (it was also at first a little disconcerting having the older Lewis bearing no resemblance to the younger one), but his emotional range gets wider, the more emotionally damaged Lewis becomes, and more subtle in the second half, making it easier to empathise with Lewis and the pain he's going through regardless of his actions. Jessica Brown-Findlay at first seemed a little lost, but the more sympathetic, hapless and tormented Alice became the more comfortable Brown-Findlay seemed.Finn Elliot is wonderful as the younger Lewis, his grief and loss heart-wrenchingly portrayed, while Hattie Morahan is charming and a breath of fresh air in contrast to the drama's overall atmosphere. Greg Wise plays uptight and stern brilliantly, and there's even one part that shows that he is not entirely devoid of feelings, and Nathaniel Parker excels in a very atypical role as the domineering and brutish Dickie Carmichael. Jessica Barden also does a fine job showcasing Kit's physical and emotional damage, she is also very convincing playing a character quite a bit younger than she is.To conclude, excellent and powerful BBC drama, that started promisingly with reservations and fared even better in the second episode. 8.5/10 Bethany Cox

This is a simple story of childhood tragedy, absence of fatherly love, and a young man with unreconciled grief and emotional turmoil. Young actor Finn Elliott turns in a remarkable performance. He's a beautiful kid and delivers a complex role with naturalness and heartbreaking authenticity.When the role is picked up by George MacKay, the transition is seamless. After a forced absence which takes place between episodes, he returns older and harder, but not repaired. As his stepmother says, a "broken thing." MacKay has turned in impressive leading performances in HOW I LIVE NOW and PRIDE. He is absolutely among the rising class of performers who will probably dominate the next generation.Greg Wise in the role of the father is cold and rigid, but isn't a monster; he's simply unequipped with emotional warmth for his son or his new wife. This television production exceeds most of the feature films I've seen this year.

The good old BBC has done it again... what a magnificent series, I cant think of any other 2 part series that was this gloomy, and yet beautiful and perfect in every sense of the word..., from the very beginning to the end, I cannot recollect even one misstep. George MacKay kills it as the protagonist, Lewis Aldridge. Im sure this guy is going to make it big... the range of emotions that he portrays is mind- boggling, he portrayed them all, each and every one of them. And once again manages to drive home the point why the brits are way better actors than their American counterparts. If I had to sum it all up in a sentence; Watching 'The Outcast', I didn't even blink once. PS: Not for people who don't like dark and gloomy dramas. PPS: If you are broken, then this is probably one of the best series that you will ever come across in your life.