Mini Reviews

Lately I watched several TV series, and while I enjoyed them and wanted to share my thoughts about them, I didn't feel the need to give them full scale reviews. What I ended up doing was tweeting around 7 tweets about each. However tweets end up buried under newer ones, and lost in the vast twitter-verse.

On Reviews and Spoilers: My Policy

Up till now my policy on spoilers was not to have them at all; to review and encourage people to watch a movie without giving anything away. I know first hand how spoilers can ruin your enjoyment when watching a movie or reading a book.

Once I was trying to decide which movie to watch at the cinema, so I went on IMDb to research. By mistake I clicked on Synopsis instead of Summary for the Spanish movie Timecrimes (2007). There was no spoiler alert. I still enjoyed the movie, however I didn't gasp at the plot twists, like everyone else in the cinema. I felt I missed on something, my viewing experience was diminished. By the way Hollywood is remaking this movie for 2012.

Edwardian Farm

Historian Ruth Goodman and archaeologists Peter Ginn and Alex Langlands are back in a new series - Edwardian Farm. This series was filmed at Morwellham Quay, a historic river port in Devon, England. It consists of twelve 60 minute episodes and shows farm life in the Edwardian Era, often highlighting how this changed from the Victorian Era.

This was an intersting time, horses were still being used for field work, but they had been replaced by water wheels for powering farm equipment and factories. Steam was still the power source of choice for trains and ships, but had either never caught on, or was already being replaced by petrol engines in other implementations.

Victorian Pharmacy

Historian Ruth Goodman of Victorian Farm fame is back, this time with Professor Nick Barber and PhD student Tom Quick. Together they recreate a Victorian Pharmacy in Blists Hill Victorian Town in Shropshire county, England. The series is made of four 60 minute episodes, and shows the 60 year evolution of the Victorian Pharmacy.

This evolution is so interesting I'll give a quick summary: In the early Victorian Era pharmacies were a novel idea, and anybody could trade as a pharmacist. Most cures were based on old beliefs and remedies. Addictive substances such as opium and cannabis were used in cures. Toxic

Victorian Farm

I wasn't planning on reviewing documentaries, however during my research I found so many interesting ones, I just had to share them. It's easy to find information about historic events and famous people, but finding information about the everyday life of Victorians is not. I want to base my novel in the city of London, however when I came across the Victorian Farm series I jumped at the chance of seeing how people in the countryside lived.

Victorian Farm has six episodes of 60 minutes, followed by Victorian Farm Christmas with three episodes. I was afraid it might just be people in period costume rearing farm animals, showing the birth of cute baby animals, and cultivating fields, but I was pleasantly surprised at the historical and technological detail. Click on the pictures to enlarge.