Dom Robinson reviews

Cert:

Cat.no: BBCDVD 1136

Running time: 196 minutes

Year: 1982

Pressing: 2002

Region(s): 2, 4 (UK PAL)

Chapters: 36

Sound: Stereo

Languages: English

Subtitles: English for the deaf and hard of hearing

Fullscreen: 4:3

16:9-enhanced: No

Macrovision: No

Disc Format: DVD 9

Price: £15.99

Extras: None

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Director:

Geoff Posner

Producer:

Paul Jackson

Screenplay:

Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Meyer

Cast:

Rik: Rik Mayall
Vyvyan Basterd: Ade Edmondson
Neil Weedon Watkins Pie: Nigel Planer
Dr Mike "the cool person": Christopher Ryan
The Balowski family: Alexei Sayle

Once in every lifetime comes a series like The Young Ones. Being only 10 at the time, I didn't really know about it until the end of the first series and then got into it when they were repeated before the second series was broadcast in 1984.

The series concentrates on four students living in a shit-tip of a house, controlled by eccentric Russian landlord Jerzei Balowski (Alexei Sayle). First up is Rik (Rik Mayall), a racist anarchist who hates Thatcher and loves Cliff Richard, then suicidal lentil-loving hippy Neil (Nigel Planer), crude medical student punk Vyvyan (Ade Edmondson) and Mike (Christopher Ryan) who isn't actually doing a student course but has photographs of the Dean and gets through life that way.

Each episode also features a music track worked bizarrely into the script, this series getting: Nine Below Zero ("Eleven Plus Eleven"), Alexei Balowski ("Dr Marten's Boots"), Madness ("House of Fun"), Dexy's Midnight Runners ("Jackie Wilson Said") and Rip Rig and Panic ("Swing Lost Paradise").

There are also offbeat sections that break away from the main storyline and visually feature none of the main cast directly, such as two rats in the skirting board having a party, the couple next door clasping their hands around a light bulb for warmth and another in which the camera zooms in on a matchbox and says "Don't look at me. I'm irrelevant!"

The first episode, Demolition, sees the beginning of the end for their first house as the council have scheduled it for demolition. Neil's already in the doghouse for making a dinner out of South African lentils that fell on the floor while being cooked, but about the house, Vyvyan takes it on himself to destroy it piece by piece after bringing home a leg from the morgue to place on the bonnet of his car.

Vyvyan enters stage-right.

Oil is so-called because the students discover said product in the basement downstairs, but they're also concerned about the divvying up of the bedrooms. Rik and Vyv fight for one in particular, until the latter sets fire to the bed to which they both respond by shouting "Neil! Your bedroom's on fire!". Mike has a better bet since he's just discovered Buddy Holly hanging upside down in his. There's hope on the horizon for Neil when he rubs a dirty teapot and reveals a genie...

Dr Marten's Boots - worth singing about.

The student are bored in Boring, but that's far from life in general as four rats play cards, two vegetables are skating around on a plate substituting for an ice rink, Goldilocks drops by for some food and the man from the "Your Country Needs You" poster has come to life and is sitting in the kitchen. The sun splits in two and Neil concludes, "Morning has broken." Things might get more interesting if you say "Ftumch", though, or when the Three Bears come after the aforementioned blonde girl.

Father Bear: "Who's been gobbing in my lentils?"
Mother and Baby Bear: "Yes, who's been gobbing in our lentils?"
Father Bear: "Sod it! Let's go to McDonalds!"

Your Country Needs You.

Demolition ended with a plane crash. Bomb starts with dropping a... er.. bomb which lands in front of the fridge... and Rik's speech,

"Polution. All around. Sometimes up... sometimes down. But always... around.
Pollution, are you coming to my town or am I coming to yours? Hah!
We're on different buses, pollution, but we're both using... petrol... bombs!"

The episode also contains three lines that I still recall quite often today, one being about Neil sleeping until 2pm, saying "Good job my alarm clock went off otherwise I would've missed half the day", then when the kettle blows up, "Oh no, it looks like the kettle must've killed itself rather than be used by me." and when Neil has to answer the door, "If I had a penny for every time I had to answer the door, I'd have £5.63.". Vyvyan excels himself too by eating the telly.

Vyvyan eats the telly.

Interesting is, overall, not quite as interesting as an episode than I was hoping for but I won't mark the rest of the disc down for it as a result. The students are planning a party. Rik's tidied up, Neil's broken the TV and since Vyvyan souped up the vacuum cleaner, it managed to suck up a friend of Neil's called... Neil, who he hasn't seen since Glastonbury. When the party does get started, though, Rik gets confused about the mouse-cum-telescope inside one of the guests' handbags.

I do wonder if this episode has been cut though as I'm sure Mike said something originally after he escorted his female "guest" into the house, but he utters nothing here. There's no cuts listed on the BBFC website so it might not have been cut, or the BBC might have cut it prior to submission.

Rik gets a present for his birthday.

"Marrow! Meringue! Boomerang!", shouts Rik on another dull day in the house while the rain pours down relentlessly causing a Flood, hence the title. Vyvyan makes himself happy by ripping up Rik's comic and Neil passes the time by banging himself over the head with a frying pan. Watch out for the potion Vyv keeps in the fridge though - anyone who drinks it turns into an axe-wielding homicidal maniac. Enter Jerzei Balowski.

Elsewhere, things look up when a game of hide-and-seek leads to the mystical land of Narnia...

Vyvyan visits the Land of Narnia.

The programme was shot in standard 4:3 and looks pretty good for it's age. There's a slight softness throughout and I only spotted one glitch in an episode where Rick was nailed to a door and the image flickered a greenish tinge as the door opened and Neil rushed in.

The back of the box states the sound is in stereo but I'd put my money on a mono soundtrack given it being 20 years old. No probs on an audio level but it doesn't particularly leap out of your speakers.

There are English subtitles, with six chapters for each episode and the menus are all static.