Viewers praise Channel 4 WW2 series - 'they don't make them like this anymore'

Viewers have hailed a Channel 4 series following a group of men through school through to their harrowing experiences in World War Two as a masterpiece, saying, "They don't make them like this anymore." Starring Gillian Barge, Nicholas Jones and Simon Russell-Beale, Dance to the Music of Time is a four-part television drama series based on the book series by Anthony Powell is now available to stream on Channel 4. It also saw Simon Russell-Beale (The Death of Stalin, The Outfit), win a BAFTA for Best Actor.

The novel was adapted for screen by Hugh Whitmore, who also produced a stage version of Alan Turing's life called Breaking The Code. With a 7.5/10 rating onIMDb, viewers have sung the praises of this mini series. One reviewer said "They don't make adaptations like this any more - no doubt for cost reasons and a lack of imagination and bravery at the TV companies." They continued: "Seven hours of solid drama, yet full of incidental humour and some very fine characterisations.

"Unfortunately it is flawed, and the flaws make it just very good viewing rather than the excellent series it should have been. The biggest flaws to my mind are: The decision to replace Nick and his wife by new actors for Film 4 was totally wrong. Nick ages far too much in too short a space of time, and looks completely different. This creates a real problem of believability.

"Still on ageing, some of the actors are 'aged' very well, whilst others (especially the ladies and Odo) seem hardly any different as the decades progress. Film 4 is by far the weakest, though to be fair this reflects the books on which it is based. Perhaps it should have been cut further and the earlier years given even greater prominence.

"Despite a great deal of pruning, there are still too many characters and insufficient narration for non-aficionados of the books to be sure all the time of who is who. The scenes often seem to be a succession of dramatic deaths - difficult to avoid with the way the story has to be condensed, but very predictable nonetheless. However, it's still pretty good, and light years removed from much of the dumbed-down drama on TV today."

Another commented saying the series was "almost perfect". They said: " Across the board, the actors are almost uniformly pleasing. Simon Russell Beale has been rightly cheered for his remarkable and daring Widmerpool, but Michael Williams (Judi Dench's late husband) is outstanding as Ted Jeavons, and Edward Fox steals every scene he's in, no surprise there. James Purefoy as Nick has to do a lot of listening, and occasionally he does it wonderfully well.

"I was not upset at the recasting of half a dozen characters in the fourth film. Some of the young actors looked quite silly in extreme age makeup as practiced 10 years ago. I'd have been happier if it had been more widespread. It took me about 8 seconds to register that Nick and Isabel and Jean were played by different actors, and then I plunged right back into the story. I'm sorry for the viewers that were derailed by the substitutions, but I wasn't.

"I am perplexed by the character of Pamela Flitton as played here in her unique patented performance by Miranda Richardson. She is a vicious, irritable, impatient, destructive, sexually voracious, uncontrolled and uncontrollable woman, everything that panics an English writer from Charles Dickens to Bram Stoker and onward.

"Pamela is a crimson-lipped vampire straight out of Hammer Horror, and not one thing she does or says has a motivation. I hope the books are more coherent in explaining why, why anything."