I was procrastinating quite a lot last night and came across The Village on iPlayer. I have now watched both episodes that have been broadcast so far, and I'm on tenterhooks for the next episode next Saturday!
The first thing that drew me to the show was the casting; Maxine Peake, Juliet Stevenson and John Simm in one show? How can you resist? I'm particularly a fan of Simm, especially after his iconic role as Sam Tyler in Life On Mars. And when he was cast as the ultimate baddy in Doctor Who.
Aside from the brilliant casting, the setting and structure of the show intrigued me. The Village works as a memoir of the second oldest man in Britain, Bert Middleton. I'm not usually a fan of a show with constant narration, and so when I first began watching, I was already dreading watching an hours worth. But I was pleasantly surprised to see that the producers had decided to use the present day Bert simply to introduce the setting of the episode, and introduce the concept of the memoir, rather than being a constant presence eating away at the quality of the episode.
The first episode depicts Bert's life as a 12 year old boy in, you guessed it, a village. World War One is imminent and poverty has hit the Middleton family hard, leaving everybody on edge, particularly John Middleton (played by John Simm), Bert's father. John Middleton is immediately conveyed as the villain, not only is he strongly against an education for his children, he doesn't appreciate elder son Joe's attempts to better their lives through a job in the 'manor' of the village. It's not that much of an exaggeration to say he despises his sons for trying to escape the farm that is his whole life. But can they be blamed for wanting to leave a home without food or love? All the two boys have are an alcoholic father and a mother struggling to hold everything together.
Joe does finally manage to escape, but I can't imagine a life as a soldier in WW1 is quite what he had planned. This again is despised by John, who doesn't even go to the village parade to celebrate and support the young men's efforts.
I was quite upset at the fact I was forced to hate John Simm when he is one of my all time favourite actors (behind David Tennant of course). Thankfully, the second episode of The Village restored my faith, if only a little. John started off the episode with his usual drunken antics, even drinking watered down beer that had been used to clean the floors of the manor (a little bit disgusting, don't you think?). It also comes to light that he's hit his wife, Grace (Maxine Peake). But you still can't feel sympathy for him when he is wrongly accused of raping and impregnating Caro Allingham (Emily Beecham) and becomes so desperate he tries to hang himself. The family stick together, despite this near-tragedy, and are even allowed to end the episode on the high with the birth of Grace and John's third child!
What I have particularly enjoyed about these two episodes is the fact it isn't sugar-coated. A lot of shows edit history to make sure Britain always looks virtuous. Yet it is clear from this account that there were problems, such as the poverty of the Middleton family, which were undermined and ignored by other sections of society. It's hard hitting and difficult viewing at times, but it's effective and memorable.
Catch up on The Village here.
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