I really looked forward to watching this, but 30 minutes in, gave up. He should re-release this with a new narrator. Was there nobody to tell him that he was ruining his own film?
I guess it's like looking at clouds. You see one thing and I see another. Peace.
I came here to see if I were the only one who had a problem with the narration. I figured I was seeing as this is rated so highly. I was fairly excited to see this pop up as a suggestion on Netflix and figured I'd spend the night watching a good documentary about film history, but nope!
I made it about ten minutes but only because I got up to do a few things. I'm not even gonna bother to check to see who narrated this mess. How can one sound boring yet haughty at the same time?
Well put.
I recorded the first four episodes because it looked really interesting. Fifteen minutes into the first one I paused and scouted the others to see if they all used the same narrator, then deleted the lot. Insanely bad.
I wasn't even giving it my full attention, I like to have stuff on while I work, but the tedious repetitive wave of his narration broke through and began crushing my spirit.
...then whoa, differences...
Watched the first episode and enjoyed it but his style of narration and inflection is seriously annoying.
Onto episode 2 now and don't think I'll finish it.
How this got released is beyond me - visually and content it seems excellent but his voice and style is beyond dull and annoying.
The inflection of the lines was annoying, although it did not bother me enough to stop watching. He sounds like he's reading a story to little children. A touch of smugness. As an overview of cinema it does a fairly good job, especially early on, with an ample supply of quality clips. Still, the narrator assumes that the viewer has little understanding or appreciation of film history. The condescension become tiresome. The closer the series comes to current times, the more suspect some of the assertions. The praise he heaps upon Robo Cop and Starship Troopers, for example, was laughable and all out of proportion to the films' modest merits. Still, this series has a lot to offer viewers who know little about the history of film. The clips alone make it worth watching, although the narration should be revised and rerecorded.
shareI say chalk this up as a good idea, but badly executed. From Mark Cousins' narration, to the errors, and that fact some important films were left out. I did not mind Cousins mentioning STARSHIP TROOPERS, but why not a film that just about influenced the whole special effects genre - 1933s KING KONG?
One of these days, someone will have a great film historical series. If one wishes to learn a good deal about the silent era, I suggest the great mini-series HOLLYWOOD, narrated by James Mason.
I see I'm not the only one put off by the narration, the upward inflection at the end of EVERY sentence!! tmaj48, earlier in this thread, you really nailed it. Hopefully Cousins will consider re-releasing it with new narration.
shareIt's simply his Northern Irish accent you feckin xenophobic cretins!
shareI gave up after 10 minutes. It wasn't just the accent and tone, but his smug and pretentious attitude that made me turn it off.
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