OT: Did anyone see Horatio Hornblower on A&E last night?

On Mon, 5 Apr 1999 09:44:46 -0700  Nathan Pettigrew
> <nathanp@MICROSOFT.com> writes:

Yeah, loved Hornblower since I was a wee lad. A & E looks to have done a good
job with it. They appear to be reasonably faithful to the books.

Looks like a pretty good book to TV version of CS Forester's Hornblower
series. Part 1 of 4 was last night (shown four times Sunday night and repeats
on Tuesday night). While it's been awhile since I read the books, the movie
seemed to follow pretty closely to the book. The acting was good and the
scenes and costumes were very good. Can't wait to see the other three parts.

http://www.aande.com/scenes/horatio/

Later,

> Nathan Pettigrew wrote:

> Looks like a pretty good book to TV version of CS Forester's

Yes I saw it, however if they are only doing 4, which 4 books are they going
to do?

> > Looks like a pretty good book to TV version of CS Forester's

They've made 4 _so far_.

I haven't read the books but I'm guessing that the production company have
taken the usual liberties with continuity. (After all, look what they did with
Sharpe...)

ITV have been showing them sporadically since last summer and the 4th was on
Good Friday. The announcer said that there would be a second series (how can
you really call it a series when there are months between episodes?) later in
the year.

According to A&E these 4 movies are all from Mr.Midshipman. Here's the exact
text:

"All four episodes of Horatio Hornblower are based on Forester's second book,
Mr.Midshipman Hornblower (1950). The films, with the occasional allowance for
dramatic license and with greatly expanded characterization, incorporate all
the adventures described in the ten chapters of Mr.Midshipman Hornblower;
however, not in the same order. Film One covers the adventures in the first
five chapters of the book; Film Two covers chapters seven, eight and nine;
Film Three is based on chapter ten; and Film Four covers chapter six."

I sure hope there are more.

Thanks, Nathan

> -----Original Message-----

> They're only doing four books (my guess is there are financial

Well, the four episodes that I've seen don't cover much of a span of his
life... He starts as a Midshipman and ends up as a Lieutenant.

And as Nathan posted, all four episodes are based on _one_ book.

There will be another series according to the announcer after the fourth
episode. Financial considerations will keep them turning out only a few
episodes a year, but if they perform well enough they'll keep on coming back
year after year....

Making all four episodes in a season out of one book seems to be a cunning
move: they won't run out books in a hurry like Sharpe (or Morse, etc.) did.

Well, They're only doing four books (my guess is there are financial
considerations here), so my guess is that instead of picking four consecutive
books, they picked four that span the life of Hornblowers career. Makes
perfect sense...

Los

> Steve Pugh wrote:

> > > Looks like a pretty good book to TV version of CS Forester's