The greatest movie ever made..!

Sadly Over-hyped

It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

This miniseries made absolutely no impression on me when a friend showed it to me a few years ago, but after hearing BBC Radio 4's highly satisfying all-star adaptation from Christmas 2013, I got a little closer to putting a finger on the certain je ne sais quoi that made this original incarnation of the property less than a success.I don't think it has anything to do with production values or the fact that the intended video-to-film transfer never took place. Of course I come from a generation that was perfectly content with low-budget and low production value theater, film and TV, so I don't feel the lack of CGI and big-name stars in this "Neverwhere" at all. What it's lacking is imagination.A really effective fantasy needs to create an imaginatively tangible atmosphere and a strong narrative that pulls you into its current. That's just not happening here. I'm sorry to say it but listening to Neil Gaiman's audio commentaries on the DVD version I'm tempted to point the finger at him for this. For one thing, he repeatedly blames the uninspiring visuals on the lack of a film-to-video transfer, which I'm not buying--judging from the video-to-film demonstration on the "Thick of It" DVD, that series would have been just as interesting to watch if it had never been transferred to film. Also other comments he makes reflect the banality of his own vision, such as his disappointment that the costumers gave Hunter a full body catsuit instead of the revealing stripper costume he'd wanted for her.Gaiman also says that when Capaldi asked him for character notes for the Angel Islington he told him, just be the most reasonable person in the room. WHAT? Anybody who's heard Benedict Cumberbatch's eerie and terrifying Angel is going to understand why this was not an inspired choice. Capaldi dutifully goes for reasonable and the effect is one of a Lamborghini negotiating its way through a suburban American subdivision with sunbonnet-wearing resin geese and concrete bunnies on every porch.Somebody on the audio commentary--I can't remember whether or not it's Gaiman--also gripes that they should have cut Peter's hair. Again, WHAT! Capaldi's beautiful head of thick chestnut curls was one of the glories of his youth and would have made a perfect halo for the Angel. Instead they seem to have either put a dark rinse on it or lit it darkly, which with the dark contact lenses they used to mask his natural gray eyes (which themselves can be quite an unearthly effect when he uses them as such) he just ends up looking more Italian, not more angelic. In fact it seems to me all the planning that went into the visual concept of the Angel seems to have focused on the stupid robe made of reflective material, which was used far more effectively years before in the "Weird Tailor" sequence of "Asylum," which is probably where they got it from.

This single BBC disc contains the 6 half hour episodes of the 1996 series written by Neil Gaiman. His first filmed work, it tells about an ordinary young man living and working in London who gets involved with a young woman from London Below, the city below the city in which the Angel Islington isn't a tube station/pub in Islington, it's an angel called Islington. It tastes of Sandman, and echoes and foreshadows other work by him (the girl is called Door, for instance).It looks quite good (the title sequence is by Dave McKean, and the unworldly air is quite well sustained) but suffers from a lack of budget especially as regards special effects. It also, in my view, suffers from having Gary Bakewell (Paul McCartney in both Backbeat and The Linda McCartney Story) play the central character with a fairly broad and distracting (and not always intelligible) Scots accent.Even so, this is an interesting first audiovisual step for Gaiman, and a fairly brave step for the BBC to have taken. Entertaining but not always successful, there had been nothing like it before, and very little since.

I was excited to see this mini series, because I had seen a couple Gaiman films. I was pretty impressed by the visual mastery in Mirrormask, so I was looking forward to it, as the synopsis was reminiscent of "alternate reality" stories, like "Weaveworld' and many others by Clive Barker. Well, the first few seconds were so excruciatingly bad, I was seriously hoping it was preview for something else.Alas, no. This was the movie, and I was looking at, what...a million hours in dog years to suffer through it? No thanx. I forced myself to sit through half of the first disk, since I pad good money for it, but that was it. I HAD TO stop. I don't know what happened, other than he was given a Mac'n'Cheese budget and two weeks in which to finish the film.I couldn't believe how many great reviews there were on this film online. I mean, did I get a different DVD set by mistake? I don't think so, the box sure looks the same.I hate being so tough on a film for having a low budget, and I do like many low budget, indie films, but this one flat out stank! I couldn't get into the plot, because the sets, costumes, and acting was so awful.So, if you are a HUGE Giaman fan...or just like low budget indie films, bu it....of course if you want to throw money away so bad, mail it to me.

You probably have to know London a bit to fully enjoy the story of Neverwhere (the series or the novel for that matter). The whole story relies on knowing a bit of the city layout, above and below :) And it's understandable that US viewers can be surprised by the low budget BBC production (unless they were familiarized with it through stuff like Dr Who which seems to be popular at the moment). Most European TVs don't get to sell their productions abroad so they won't invest as heavily as the US productions.I read the novel long before I could get my hands on the DVD (actually way before I was even aware of anything being available in filmed form, much less as a DVD). For some reason the only release seems to be for the US market.Regarding the Neverwhere series, yes, while the cast is mostly good, some of the actors are so-so. Even with the obviously shoestring budget, the sets and costumes are quite inventive and convincingly used. The directing unfortunately is really poor and it does quite a bit of damage to the effectiveness of the whole.If you have read and enjoyed the novel, you will find the series to be something imperfect yes but also something that you can watch with fondness. Possibly a proper adaptation by a proper director with a decent budget would be nice. But it's unlikely it will ever happen. Isn't it better to enjoy what's available even if it could theoretically be better ?