Three years after A Taste For Death, the P. D. James mysteries returned with Devises and Desires in 1991. Yet despite the various plot strands and themes, plus the record amount of deaths in a P. D. James mystery (8 in all), there is something oddly detached about this adaptation. It was also the last of the 6 part mysteries that viewers were familiar to, and subsequent adaptations never had the same pull after that. I'm tempted to say the reason is due to this adaptation, but to be fair to it I have also read the novel and couldn't get into that either. I'm not sure the makers could of done any better to be honest as the main problem is that for all it's different characters and plot strands this production just lacks life - or more particularly the characters do!
Not that it starts out that way. It's opening is very effective, as teenager Valerie Mitchell (Sophie Ashton) leaves a disco one night after falling out with her boyfriend, but upon missing her bus decides to walk home before being given a lift in a car by two old ladies. Dropped off about half a mile from her home, she thinks she is safe to walk the rest of the way there, only to encounter the serial killer that is stalking the Norfolk area (no, it's not Howard the Duck), a character nicknamed The Whistler. P. D. James really does atmosphere well in her novels and it comes across here as the scenes building up to the murder, plus the encounter of The Whistler in the woods are remarkably frightening. It only makes you regret that the rest of this mystery does not keep up to the same opening high standards.
Dalgliesh himself appears soon after on holiday to sort through the effects of his aunt who has died recently (what a holiday!), and soon meets the other characters that populate the area - and there are a LOT of characters to meet. There are the Blaney family, headed by alcoholic widower Ryan, whose teenage daughter Theresa looks after the children; single mum Amy Camm and her toddler son Jimmy, plus boyfriend Neil Pascoe, who all live in a caravan near the beach. Then there are two female novelists who live together in a cottage (but not like you're thinking), Meg Dennison and Alice Rowe, while Alice's brother Alex runs the Nuclear Power Station nearby along with a bunch of less than happy co-workers who all live nearby in unspecified areas. Finally there are bickering Pub owners George and Doris Jago, plus local handiman Neville Potter, who lives in a caravan with his alcoholic mother. Considering that a serial killer is loose in the area, you'd think it would dominate conversation, but the main issue here is the Nuclear Power station, with on the one side giving employment to some of the locals who work there, and others who oppose it, such as the caravan couple Neil and Amy, who are environmentalists who often trawl the beaches to look for birds to clean (of oil and not as a hobby, you understand) so concerned are they about the environmental damage it may cause. And there is one employer, Toby Glenhill, who is having concerns about his work at the Power Station - not least because someone has hacked into the computers and infected it with a virus.
Indeed, considering this starts out as a serial killer mystery, it gets somewhat distracted by all the different characters and plot strands. As well as serial killing, this contains themes such as terrorism, alcoholism, threat of homelessness, sexual abuse, abortion, suicides, brother-sister relationships, plus homosexuality and lesbianism (two for the price of one this time) and a lot of bed hopping by characters who seem non-plussed about who they sleep with. And despite having six episodes to bed the characters down (no pun intended), these relationships have little in the way of chemistry or belief in them. For example, Amy Camm is determinedly anti-Nuclear, yet despite this and having a boyfriend she is also having an affair with the boss of the Nuclear Power station, Alex Rowe! Does this not go against her principles? In another example Toby Glenhill ends up sleeping with colleague Hilary Robards when meeting her topless on the beach seemingly just on a whim and on that one moment becomes infatuated by her. Then there are the characters Miles Lessingham and Caroline Amphlett, who both turn out to be gay, but whose sexuality is barely even discussed in length. Considering how much effort has been put into all these plot strands, there is little time for much depth for all these subjects and the writers rather sell their stories short.
There are also elements that are a little unsavory in this. As mentioned, there is a serial killer at work and before long two employees from the Power Station become the latest murder victims, leading to Dalgliesh and the police (headed by local copper Terry Rickards) to suspect that The Whistler may work at the Power Station. There are even suggestions that the killer could be a woman, due to the dog seen about the area, with closet lesbian Caroline Amphlett having a similar sort of dog and lack of alibi (suggestions of repressed sexuality, presumably?). But it's the details of forcing pubic hair in the victims' mouths that leave a bad taste (so to speak) and felt rather gratuitous and unnecessary.
Another problem with this adaptation is that the Power Station suffers the death of two staff members (and more to follow as the case continues, for various reasons), but their losses are barely felt. And that is because most of the characters in this struggle to come to life and are so uninteresting that you don't really care much for them. The dinner party debate involving Alex Rowe (James Faulkner) and Hilary Robards (Suzan Crowley) is one such case, so lacking in life is it. Crowley probably deserves some credit for bravely taking on the nudity she has to do in this, but her character is such a pantomime villain with the various people she upsets that you just know she is set up as the next victim, but cannot really care when she does meet her end. And that is with many of the characters. Ryan Blaney (Tom Georgeson) is under threat of eviction by Hilary, a struggling artist with kids to support who has turned to drink after the death of his wife. Yet he is such a unpleasant and miserable character (do you think Tom Georgeson ever yearns to play a cheerful soul sometimes?) that you do not really care for his plight, especially when he leaves his poor teenage daughter Theresa (Lisa Ellis) to look after his children while he wallows in self pity. It is her who is one of the few people who attracts our sympathy in this, and Ellis makes a good impression in her screen debut. Alex Rowe is similarly dull, while others are merely peripheral, such as Miles Lessingham and Jonathan Reeves, considering they are suspects in a murder case. Meanwhile Caroline Amphlett (Helena Michell) has more screen time, but her character is such an enigma that it is hard to engage with the character, and that is true with so many in this.
Of the few exceptions, Gemma Jones deserves huge credit for her nuanced portrayal of Alice Rowe, still haunted by abuse suffered by her father and worried about her brother. It's interesting to note that in the flashback scenes, the young Alex is played by James Faulkner's son Guy, but Kate Beckinsale does NOT appear as the young Alice - you only hear her voice. The only other performance that feels fresh is Nicola Cowper as single mum Ann Camm, but it is her activist boyfriend Neil Pascoe (Robert Hines) who you end up feeling for in the end. As for Dalgliesh, while Roy Marsden is engaging and sympathetic as usual, as has been pointed out in a number of reviews on here his character is basically a voyeur in this. He is not in charge of investigations - that is Det Insp Terry Rickards (a lovely performance by Tony Haygarth) - and eventually ends up helpless in stopping any of the many deaths that occur in this mystery. Indeed, it is Rickards who makes one crucial deduction when they go over the many victims of The Whistler, not Dalgliesh. By the end of all this he has not had an effect in any of the investigations, other than spotting the true killer, and by the conclusion the overall feeling is how many lives have been left devastated by the occurrences in this case.
This mystery, with all it's plot lines and incidents, should of been far better than it is. The first couple of episodes with The Whistler are superbly handled and chilling, but the characters are just not interesting or engaging enough to really care about them. With many of P. D. James adaptations they are set in a institution or workplace, such as a Laboratory, Hospital or Convalescent Home, with the focus on that. Here we have a Nuclear Power Station, but there are so few scenes of colleagues working together as for it to be redundant and almost pointless. Indeed, this adaptation's problem is that the characters are too far spread out, with only peripheral connections to each other and no rapport between many of them. And there are also scenes that are left unanswered, such as who was drinking with the victim Hilary Robards the night she died (Dalgliesh and Rickards discover two glasses on her table), and why does one character commit suicide by jumping off the Nuclear Power Station? For those approaching P. D. James for the first time, this probably will serve quite well as a decent mystery to watch. But for others accustomed to her earlier adaptations, this is a strange misfire. For all it's atmosphere and plot devises, it lacks much of the desire and just does not gel.
Not that it starts out that way. It's opening is very effective, as teenager Valerie Mitchell (Sophie Ashton) leaves a disco one night after falling out with her boyfriend, but upon missing her bus decides to walk home before being given a lift in a car by two old ladies. Dropped off about half a mile from her home, she thinks she is safe to walk the rest of the way there, only to encounter the serial killer that is stalking the Norfolk area (no, it's not Howard the Duck), a character nicknamed The Whistler. P. D. James really does atmosphere well in her novels and it comes across here as the scenes building up to the murder, plus the encounter of The Whistler in the woods are remarkably frightening. It only makes you regret that the rest of this mystery does not keep up to the same opening high standards.
Dalgliesh himself appears soon after on holiday to sort through the effects of his aunt who has died recently (what a holiday!), and soon meets the other characters that populate the area - and there are a LOT of characters to meet. There are the Blaney family, headed by alcoholic widower Ryan, whose teenage daughter Theresa looks after the children; single mum Amy Camm and her toddler son Jimmy, plus boyfriend Neil Pascoe, who all live in a caravan near the beach. Then there are two female novelists who live together in a cottage (but not like you're thinking), Meg Dennison and Alice Rowe, while Alice's brother Alex runs the Nuclear Power Station nearby along with a bunch of less than happy co-workers who all live nearby in unspecified areas. Finally there are bickering Pub owners George and Doris Jago, plus local handiman Neville Potter, who lives in a caravan with his alcoholic mother. Considering that a serial killer is loose in the area, you'd think it would dominate conversation, but the main issue here is the Nuclear Power station, with on the one side giving employment to some of the locals who work there, and others who oppose it, such as the caravan couple Neil and Amy, who are environmentalists who often trawl the beaches to look for birds to clean (of oil and not as a hobby, you understand) so concerned are they about the environmental damage it may cause. And there is one employer, Toby Glenhill, who is having concerns about his work at the Power Station - not least because someone has hacked into the computers and infected it with a virus.
Indeed, considering this starts out as a serial killer mystery, it gets somewhat distracted by all the different characters and plot strands. As well as serial killing, this contains themes such as terrorism, alcoholism, threat of homelessness, sexual abuse, abortion, suicides, brother-sister relationships, plus homosexuality and lesbianism (two for the price of one this time) and a lot of bed hopping by characters who seem non-plussed about who they sleep with. And despite having six episodes to bed the characters down (no pun intended), these relationships have little in the way of chemistry or belief in them. For example, Amy Camm is determinedly anti-Nuclear, yet despite this and having a boyfriend she is also having an affair with the boss of the Nuclear Power station, Alex Rowe! Does this not go against her principles? In another example Toby Glenhill ends up sleeping with colleague Hilary Robards when meeting her topless on the beach seemingly just on a whim and on that one moment becomes infatuated by her. Then there are the characters Miles Lessingham and Caroline Amphlett, who both turn out to be gay, but whose sexuality is barely even discussed in length. Considering how much effort has been put into all these plot strands, there is little time for much depth for all these subjects and the writers rather sell their stories short.
There are also elements that are a little unsavory in this. As mentioned, there is a serial killer at work and before long two employees from the Power Station become the latest murder victims, leading to Dalgliesh and the police (headed by local copper Terry Rickards) to suspect that The Whistler may work at the Power Station. There are even suggestions that the killer could be a woman, due to the dog seen about the area, with closet lesbian Caroline Amphlett having a similar sort of dog and lack of alibi (suggestions of repressed sexuality, presumably?). But it's the details of forcing pubic hair in the victims' mouths that leave a bad taste (so to speak) and felt rather gratuitous and unnecessary.
Another problem with this adaptation is that the Power Station suffers the death of two staff members (and more to follow as the case continues, for various reasons), but their losses are barely felt. And that is because most of the characters in this struggle to come to life and are so uninteresting that you don't really care much for them. The dinner party debate involving Alex Rowe (James Faulkner) and Hilary Robards (Suzan Crowley) is one such case, so lacking in life is it. Crowley probably deserves some credit for bravely taking on the nudity she has to do in this, but her character is such a pantomime villain with the various people she upsets that you just know she is set up as the next victim, but cannot really care when she does meet her end. And that is with many of the characters. Ryan Blaney (Tom Georgeson) is under threat of eviction by Hilary, a struggling artist with kids to support who has turned to drink after the death of his wife. Yet he is such a unpleasant and miserable character (do you think Tom Georgeson ever yearns to play a cheerful soul sometimes?) that you do not really care for his plight, especially when he leaves his poor teenage daughter Theresa (Lisa Ellis) to look after his children while he wallows in self pity. It is her who is one of the few people who attracts our sympathy in this, and Ellis makes a good impression in her screen debut. Alex Rowe is similarly dull, while others are merely peripheral, such as Miles Lessingham and Jonathan Reeves, considering they are suspects in a murder case. Meanwhile Caroline Amphlett (Helena Michell) has more screen time, but her character is such an enigma that it is hard to engage with the character, and that is true with so many in this.
Of the few exceptions, Gemma Jones deserves huge credit for her nuanced portrayal of Alice Rowe, still haunted by abuse suffered by her father and worried about her brother. It's interesting to note that in the flashback scenes, the young Alex is played by James Faulkner's son Guy, but Kate Beckinsale does NOT appear as the young Alice - you only hear her voice. The only other performance that feels fresh is Nicola Cowper as single mum Ann Camm, but it is her activist boyfriend Neil Pascoe (Robert Hines) who you end up feeling for in the end. As for Dalgliesh, while Roy Marsden is engaging and sympathetic as usual, as has been pointed out in a number of reviews on here his character is basically a voyeur in this. He is not in charge of investigations - that is Det Insp Terry Rickards (a lovely performance by Tony Haygarth) - and eventually ends up helpless in stopping any of the many deaths that occur in this mystery. Indeed, it is Rickards who makes one crucial deduction when they go over the many victims of The Whistler, not Dalgliesh. By the end of all this he has not had an effect in any of the investigations, other than spotting the true killer, and by the conclusion the overall feeling is how many lives have been left devastated by the occurrences in this case.
This mystery, with all it's plot lines and incidents, should of been far better than it is. The first couple of episodes with The Whistler are superbly handled and chilling, but the characters are just not interesting or engaging enough to really care about them. With many of P. D. James adaptations they are set in a institution or workplace, such as a Laboratory, Hospital or Convalescent Home, with the focus on that. Here we have a Nuclear Power Station, but there are so few scenes of colleagues working together as for it to be redundant and almost pointless. Indeed, this adaptation's problem is that the characters are too far spread out, with only peripheral connections to each other and no rapport between many of them. And there are also scenes that are left unanswered, such as who was drinking with the victim Hilary Robards the night she died (Dalgliesh and Rickards discover two glasses on her table), and why does one character commit suicide by jumping off the Nuclear Power Station? For those approaching P. D. James for the first time, this probably will serve quite well as a decent mystery to watch. But for others accustomed to her earlier adaptations, this is a strange misfire. For all it's atmosphere and plot devises, it lacks much of the desire and just does not gel.