Product Description

All humans eat vegetables. But what if we were the helpless ones, and the plants were eating us? Following the Earth's close encounter with a comet, a meteor shower strikes Britain's population blind. Bill Masen, recovering in a London hospital from a vicious plant attack, is one of only a few people to survive with his eyesight intact. But the world he emerges to has altered terrifyingly into a nightmare where man-eating plants -- the triffids -- are gathering in force!

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #44966 in DVD
• Brand: Warner Brothers
• Released on: 2007-11-06
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Subtitled in: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: 1.00 pounds
• Running time: 147 minutes

Amazon.com
If the notion of being pursued across the countryside by monstrous, ambulatory stalks of rhubarb strikes terror into your soul, then this British TV adaptation of sci-fi novelist John Wyndham's The Day of the Triffids will be right up your hedgerow. If not, well, perhaps its more campy elements will carry the day. As adapted (and significantly abridged) by Douglas Livingstone and directed by Ken Hannam, the story is serialized in six parts, each about 25 minutes long. In the first, we meet protagonist Bill Masen (John Duttine), who knows all about the rhubarb… um, the triffids… having spent some time working among the folks who harvest their valuable oil extracts. Seems these strange plant thingies, whose origin is most mysterious, can not only walk (albeit at a pace that makes The Lord of the Rings trilogy's Ents seem like Olympic sprinters) but kill, subduing victims with their whip-like stingers and then consuming the rotting flesh; indeed, one of the triffids almost nailed our hero, which is why he's hospitalized when we first see him. Next thing you know, some kind of toxic celestial event has lit up the skies and blinded everyone who dared look at it, leaving most of the population sightless and stumbling about the streets of London (and everywhere else); only those who missed the calamitous light show, including Bill and soon-to-be love interest Jo (Emma Relph), can still see, while the triffids, who multiply in frightening numbers, proceed to lay waste to everyone else. There are some interesting ideas developed along the way, including the inevitable breakdown of civilization as the survivors struggle to begin anew while dealing with the implacable triffids. But the execution of said ideas is lacking; shot on video, the show has a flat, rather cheesy look, along with low-rent special effects (the triffids are laughable), less than stellar acting, and dialogue straight out of a soap opera. In the end, the fact that this Day of the Triffids is considered better than the 1962 film adaptation with Howard Keel is probably its principal attraction. --Sam Graham

Customer Reviews

BBC adaptation that is faithful to the original novel...
NOTE: As I own the 2/4 region version of this film, my review deals with the substance of the story (NO spoilers!). I have preordered a copy coming from Amazon and will update my review immediately after receiving that one.

This is a six part mini-series based on the book by John Wyndham, first broadcast in the UK in 1981 and subsequently shown on PBS (where I first saw it). The Day of the Triffids is quite the father to "28 Days Later", in that it is an end-of-the world-as-we-know-it tale, but it has a good deal less gore and offers up a romance between the leads John Duttine (as Bill Masen) and Emma Relph (as Josella Payton).

The plot centers on two main elements: the introduction of a complex, new form of plant life that provides a highly profitable type of oil and the appearance of a massive meteor shower that is eagerly viewed by most of the inhabitants of the world.

As this is a BBC television production, the sense of a play unfolding and the accents of some of the characters may not appeal to some American viewers. Yet, the dialogue is crisp and the emotional interplay very human in a situation where the world seems to have gone mad. The special effects are minimal but fairly convincing (remember this was made over 25 years ago).

This is one of my favourite science-fiction movies of all time. The actors do a very solid job of bringing the characters to life, there is a very real feeling of dread as the veiled nature of the triffids becomes apparent and the responses of various peoples to the crisis rings true throughout.

It should be noted that an earlier effort at adapting the book for film starred Howard Keel (many will have seen this courtesy late night movies). That version ended up quite a mishmash and strayed very far from the source material - I would assign it just two stars.

I highly recommend The Day of the Triifids done by the BBC.

NOTE: Received the Region 1 version from Amazon. It is a near exact copy of the other; again highly recommend this disc!

FINALLY IT'S HERE
THIS [THE ORIGINAL BBC VERSION] IS FAITHFUL TO JOHN WYNDHAMS BOOK. I'VE BEEN WAITING FOR OVER 20 YEARS TO GET A PROFESSIONAL COPY OF IT. WHEN I FIRST SAW IT IN 1985, I MADE A VHS COPY WHICH I WORE OUT IN 10 YEARS! I WISH THAT THEY HAD REMASTERED THE SOUND [DOLBY DIGITAL] AS WELL AS THE PICTURE. IT'S APPROACH [LIKE MOST MOVIES FROM THE UK] IS RELATIVELY LOW KEY [IT'S NOT A SHOOT EM UP!]. IF YOU'VE SEEN THIS PRESENTATION BEFORE, GET IT FOR YOUR LIBRARY. IT'S HEAD & SHOULDERS ABOVE THE 1962 MOVIE BEARING THE SAME NAME. YOU WON'T BE DISAPPOINTED!

Excellent adaptation of John Wyndham sf novel
I was delighted to see that this British mini-series adaptation of John Wyndham's sf novel "Day of the Triffids" will now be available on American DVD. I had a copy on VHS which I had taped when the series had been shown on my local PBS station, but I made the mistake of loaning it to a couple of idiots who somehow managed to break it. (How do you break a videotape, I'd like to know?)

In Wyndham's novel, a strange world-wide disaster leaves mankind vulnerable to the triffids, a species of mobile plants whose origins are unknown. The story follows one man (played by John Duttine, star of another popular British series "To Serve Then All My Days") who by chance was unaffected by the disaster and his travels around England, trying to find others like himself and re-establish civilization. It adheres very closely to the novel and the writing and acting are up to the usual high British standards. Much better than the earlier American version with its ridiculous "Wizard of OZ" ending. (I like Howard Keel, but he should stick to musicals.)

Highly recommended.