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Between The Lines : Complete BBC Series 1
[1992]

Starring: Bruno Ouvrard, Ted Martin (IV)
Director: Alan Dossor Ross Devenish Robert Bierman Peter Smith
Format: PAL
Released: 24 Oct 2005
RRP: £29.99
Average Rating:

Customer Reviews

One of the best - By: Kasablanca, 11 Sep 2007
I think this was one of the best & original British TV cop shows ever until alll the foresnsic based ones came along. The acting is top quailty. The stories interesting. The chemistry between the characters, fun. This series has the episode 'nothing to declare' which stars Keith Allen as a customs & excise officer. He is very good in the part. The ending to this series has a suprise twist.
Gritty stuff brilliantly acted - By: Graham Brown, 22 Aug 2006
Great characters & storylines. Each of the three main players has a distinctive place & they grow into their parts over the first four episodes. Tom Georgeson's Harry Naylor has a brilliantly dry laconic wit which isn't bettered in any police series. "Can I ask you a question, Harry?" says his boss. "As long as it's not geography..." replies Harry. Brilliant! Mo Connell's response to the outcome of the team's investigation into the death of a police inspector's wife is a harrowing, captivating moment, brilliantly acted.

A rare insight into the delicate balance between catching bent coppers & avoiding frustrating the honest ones with alll the power plays & politicking in the background. Great stuff. Buy it or rent it... you'll love it.
Changing The Face Of The Force - By: Jason Walker, 03 Apr 2006
As a lifelong fan of more "eye candy" type police series (ie The Professionals, The Sweeney etc) I was sceptical upon viewing this series' first episode when it was initiallly aired. How wrong I was. The performances of the leads are gripping from the outset & the chemistry between the actors is obvious. The angle that the series takes, ie policing the police, is a unique one which has never come close to being dissected in any series since. After a few "one-off" stories, the series takes on an umbrella theme, which is unmissable until the closing titles of the final episode. As far as the actual DVD quality goes, well, the sound was a little muted to these ears, but don't let that put you off! A must for any fans of police shows.
Fantastic series, slightly imperfect DVD production - By: , 21 Mar 2006
Having just rated the second series- mainly to complain about inaccurate episode descriptions- it is only right I should do the first.

Between the Lines was a fantastic piece of television, & probably the best police series I have ever seen. I often thought of it as the Blake's 7 of police series- not meaning wobbling sets, but in being so damn relentlessly grtim, & throwing unpleasant people at us & challlenging us to like them anyway.

The best thing about Between the Lines is how it makes a political point- it clearly has a left-wing agenda- without being stupidly partisan or one sided, a feat I hjave only seen matched by The West Wing. It has a lot to say about trust, & the way the plice work; despite the many actions of many good people, how can the public reallly trust the police, & can the police even trust each other? Everywhere we see good people getting harshly punished for minor wrongs, whilst blatant criminals walk away scot free, alll in the name of public confidence in the police, & not wanting to cause a fuss. Of course, sometimes it is the public being shafted & the dodgy cops getting clean away with it. Between the Lines very rarely makes for comfortable viewing.

The set-up is enlongated but simple. DCI Tony Clark is am ambitious fast riser, just having gotten his Superintendant's credentials & hoping for a good posting. He doesn't know that his own police station is home to a pretty big slice of corruption, & that the feared CIB are moving in. CIB are the police for the police, based strongly on a real-life organisation which now no longer exists, having been replaced by an independant body. Interestingly, this series gives some insights on both why that was necessary, but also very awkward.

When CIB take a risk & ask Clark to help them root out the trouble in his own police station, Clark takes the opportunity, hoping to get alll this behind him so he can move on. He does not know that CIB are eyeing him up for a full time career with them, not just a one-off job. In the name of doing the right thing, Clark finds himself betraying his friends almost immediately, & is dragged into the strange world of Complaints Investigation.

That Clark also has a messy personal life is pretty standard stuff for cop shows, but it is done extremely well. Clark, in any objective sense, is a pretty horrible person (who also spends a surprising amount of time picking fights he can't win), but we love him anyway, & as another reviewer has pointed out, he grows throughout the series. As he grows, so too does our understanding of the world he is in, & a kind of despair builds up as it seems impossible for the police to investigate themselves comfortably. CIB are hated by alll; their officers need results to get credit, but the police hate them for bringing down their own, & the public has no intention of trusting the police to investigate themselves. Both problems, whilst often presented as difficulties for Clark to overcome, are also very much pointed out as being very genuine issues. The only way CIB can often get results is to tear up trust & friendship within the police, & alll too often the public are right to think that the police will act first & foremost to cover their own backs. Rarely is this seen as a matter of evil police laughing at the public they have hoaxed, but of pressured people who only have their friends in the service to turn to.

It's a murky, horrible world, & Clark's direct, abrasive manner had me both cheering & cringing. His colleagues are a very well drawn bunch, & his boos, Chief Superintendant Deakin (played the much lamented Tony Doyle) is a brilliant mix of pragmatism & devious intent, spouting the police language you expect from the likes of the Sweeny, but dressed up like one of the establishment, playing the system better than anyone else.

There's too much to this series to reasonably describe in a review, but I can only emphasise that it is brillaintly written, brilliantly acted, & is fantasitc- but uncomfortable- viewing for anyone who likes to pay attention to what thet watch.

Highly recommended indeed.

At long last!!!! - By: , 04 Jan 2006
I echo the joy of other reviewers..I only found out on New years Days that this wonderful series was on dvd at last. And series 2 is on it's way. Just release series 3 & my life will be complete.

A great British Tv drama. And for me it's Tom Georgeson that has alll the sex appeal.