Inspector Lynley - A Great Deliverance

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Starring: Nathaniel Parker; Sharon Small; Anthony Calf; Amanda Ryan; Emma Fielding; Nicholas Day; Paul Brennen; Rebecca Gallacher; Brendan Coyle; Pooky Quesnel; Cate Hamer; Denise Black; Peter Halliday; Matthew Dunster; Caroline Carver; Colum Convey; Howard Ward; Rob Swinton; Bethany Wysoczanski; June Watson
Rated: NR (Not Rated)
Type: DVD
Directed By: Richard Laxton
Studio: WGBH BOSTON
Release Date: 2003-07-29
Running Time: 180 minutes
Talk about a puzzling case. Detective Inspector Thomas Lynley of Scotland Yard (Nathaniel Parker, Far from the Maddding Crowd) is assigned to investigate the gruesome murder of a farmer in a seemingly peaceful country village, but it’s his new partner, Sgt. Barbara Havers (Sharon Small, About a Boy), whom he’s finding indecipherable. Havers is as gritty, rumpled, and working-class as the Inspector is refined, well-heeled, and sophisticated.

Is the murderer the farmer’s shy daughter who was found next to her father’s decapitated corpse? The nephew who stands to inherit the farm? The estranged wife who’s protecting her new family from an unsightly past? Or is it a suspicious village resident with a shady past and a weak alibi?

Based on the best-selling mystery by Elizabeth George, A Great Deliverance introduces Inspector Lynley with first-rate performances and abundant amounts of nail-biting suspense.

Special DVD features include: virtual tour of the Mystery! studio; Q&A with Nathaniel Parker and Sharon Small; selected cast filmographies; selected cast list; biography for Diana Rigg, host of Mystery!; bibliography for Elizabeth George; selected cast list; link to the Mystery! Web site; closed captions; and described video for the visually impaired.

On one DVD9 disc. Region coding: All regions. Audio: Dolby stereo. Screen format: Letterboxed.

great deliverence-great mystery-great production
I had read the book several times. I was a bit disappointed that Simon the best friend's history was not treated in the show and also Bridie the little girl of the fiancee of the deceased was hardly shown at all. The rest of the production was quite good.

The Beginnings of a Wonderful Partnership....
2001's "A Great Deliverance" is the superb two-part pilot for BBC/PBS's Inspector Lynley Mysteries. Like any good pilot episode, much screen time is devoted to introducing the cast, but "A Great Deliverance" manages a gruesome, twisting murder mystery into the bargain.

Inspector Thomas Lynley is an up-and-coming detective at Scotland Yard; he is also an aristocrat, well-educated, well-heeled, and resented by his less fortunate fellow police. As the story opens, he has just had the emotionally trying experience of standing best man for his friend Simon, who marries a woman with whom Lynley himself was in love.

Sergeant Barbara Havers is single, working class, rumpled, and resentful, but a good cop nonetheless. Her cross to bear is two aging parents who need more care than she can provide. She and Lynley are put on a rural Yorkshire murder case in a partnership their bosses hope will drive one or both out of service.

The murder itself is complicated. A parish priest finds a parishioner dead, beheaded in his own barn on top of the corpse of his dog, with his young daughter sitting by, stricken mute with horror. Lynley and Havers must weed out a sizeable cast of suspects without much cooperation from the local police. They must also deal with their respective personal baggage. Out of the challenge comes the beginnings of a wonderful partnership, as Lynley and Havers discover respect and loyalty in each other and begin to create the nicely nuanced relationship that is the heart of this long-running series.

The episode was shot on location in Yorkshire, with a generous landscape and a variety of farmhouses and inns as settings. The dialogue is crisp. The audience gets the clues, and the red herrings, at the same rate as the detectives. The story holds most of its secrets nearly to the end. "A Great Deliverance" is very highly recommended to fans of the Inspector Lynley Mysteries as the one that started it all.

At last: the beginning
Everything is okay with the dvd, even my player could read it.
It is great for me to hear the actots in their mother tongue.
Recommended.

Lynley begins
This was the first of the Inspector Lynley series, now unfortunately discontinued. Most of the elements of the series are present, and for those who missed out on the beginnings, here they are. For those unfamiliar with the story, it's all about a blue-blood inspector paired with a working-class sergeant. Comes off very well. The British seem to have a flair for this sort of thing.

Inspector Lynley- A Great Deliverance
For every fan of British mystery this first installment of Inspector Lynley will start you on another intense series.