Yes,I know this is a TV version and therefore impressionable children may be watching, (even after the British 9pm watershed) but the final guillotine sequence was wholly unconvincing.I went with my late parents in 1965 to the Conciergerie on the Ile de Paris where they imprisoned the condemned, before their final ride in the tumbrils.There they had a room where they severely cut off the hair of the condemned because otherwise the blade would not cut through the neck cleanly.Yet again producers do not do enough technical research regarding being dispatched by "The National Razor".The 1935 version with Ronald Coleman was farcical in this respect.As he came up the stairs he had his high collar up before issuing forth with, "It is a far far better thing...." speech.In the subject 1980 TV version, you have Chris Sarandon as Sydney Carton mounting the scaffold stairs with shoulder length hair! There are many other films which inaccurately portray the methods used in capital punishment and it was not until I saw Timothy Spall in "Pierrepoint" that we saw an accurate rendition.I know this is a bit ghoulish but I would rate the overall production as just about "adequate" and I awarded it a rating of 6/10.It was good to see Kenneth More in one of his last roles as Jarvis Laurie.
Review of A Tale of Two Cities
