Jem Odewahn Watching this again after first seeing the mini-series on TV a few years back, I am again left stunned by "Mary Bryant". It has to be one of the best productions to have ever come out of Australia. Based on the true story of a female convict who escaped the harsh penal colony in the 1700's, this is an absorbing, well-acted work.Romola Garai turns in her best performance thus far as Mary Bryant. Garai makes Mary alternately fascinating, infuriating, gutsy, heartless, direct and selfless. The film opens with Mary Bryant, nee Broad, running along the Cornwall coastline (actually Kiama, NSW), with voice-over from Garai. Born of a fishing family, Mary is 17, wild, independent-minded and starving. Convicted of theft, she is transported to Botany Bay. In the opening five minutes, the three protagonists are effortlessly produced. Garai boards the ship, and the camera pans to fellow convict, the laughing, handsome Will Bryant (Alex O'Loughlin), who will become Mary's husband and soul mate. We then cut to Lt Ralph Clarke (Jack Davenport), the man who will be passionately, obsessively in love with her, and will stop at no lengths to have her at his side.Davenport's Clarke is, for me, the most interesting part of this excellent production. He gives a wonderful performance as the strict soldier who will order a ferocious whipping or hanging then tenderly caress Mary's face. The film is cut and shot in a way that actually makes us sympathize, and associate Mary more with Clarke than her husband. Garai and Davenport share a volatile chemistry in these scenes, and the viewer is torn between Mary's determination to have the best for her struggling family and her use of Clarke as merely a sexual tool for her to get the key to the supply room for their daring escape. When they meet again on the beaches of Timor, the confrontation is surely one of the most emotionally moments I have yet seen. And, later, emotion does not get any rawer than Garai's speech in the courtroom back in England.

merilynd I sat through Mary Bryant and I was completely bored. It was a totally overblown and long drawn out saga, heavily padded with long, lingering, meaningless close ups and many trivial mistakes. Without those close ups which added nothing, the piece would have been half as long which would have been better. It was also totally unrealistic and laughable to watch.In the very first scene Mary (Romola Garai) robbed a women in an isolated wood in Cornwall and then, from nowhere, up came two men and arrested her. That was just funny. It looked for all the world as if the robbed woman had called the police on her mobile. Where did they come from? How did they get there?Then Mary was sentenced to go to Australia, and the appalling conditions on the boat were depicted in great detail. People were starving and dying of disease, the lucky ones survived. Mary's baby was born on this boat and then arrived at Sydney Cove fit, clean and healthy. Yes, Mary's baby truly did survive this voyage, presumably fed by Mary, but if Mary herself was starving, how was the baby so bouncing? In spite of the desperate hunger and hardship the baby then grew up to be quite a sturdy little girl (Charlotte). At Sydney Cove there was one scene where a character wrote a list of supplies with what looked suspiciously like a ball point pen, it could have been a fountain pen, but it certainly wasn't a quill pen. The quills appeared later.Then Mary Bryant had another baby. This one also thrived and stayed healthy looking throughout the drama never losing any weight during it's long 3,000 mile journey in a boat with few supplies and what did they do for water? In fact none of the actors lost so much as an ounce on that long journey. They did have signs of scurvy at one point but that miraculously disappeared in sight of land. Also realistically their white skins would have been terribly burnt in that open boat. Why was that not shown?The scenes in Timor were just ludicrous. Jack Davenport (as Lt. Ralph Clarke) is always worth watching, but even his endless close-ups began to pall, and Mary Bryant's husband (Alex O'Loughlin) was very handsome in a 2006 way and had cosmetically perfect, shiny, white teeth which helped very much with his close-ups, but added not atouch of realism to the drama.Romola Garai was great in "I captured the Castle", but I did get tired of staring at close ups of her. Her expressions were rather blank as well.As befits British people arriving in Australia the convicts all had British accents, bar one, actor David Field, who had an Australian accent, however he was one of the few convincing looking convicts. I don't expect accents to be uniform, but uniformly British would be desirable.As this was a true story I stayed with it in order to see what happened to Mary.At the end Mary Bryant all dressed up, clean and looking not a minute older, returned to Cornwall. Presumably she had received financial assistance, however she had absolutely no luggage. With nothing in her hand at all, she walked cheerfully down to her village, which we never see (and in which she was originally starving) and then we do not know what happens to her. Not even a little hint in the credits at the end.I think when actors are portraying great suffering they should miss a few meals on location and perhaps a smaller baby could be used to show malnutrition. I also expect more from the make-up department. I do not expect the children to be starved for the role, but perhaps less bonny looking children could be used, and less obviously well fed actors.A lot of money went into this production but God is in the details and the details weren't there.My husband's comment was "Well I'll sleep well tonight!"

mkmumof3 Although this is a wonderful movie, well acted, beautiful scenery, emotive scenes. So I was very disappointed when I wanted to learn more about the 'true story'. I went to several websites & was annoyed to find that about 70% of the film was 'artistic license'!Lt Clarke was fictitious, so therefore his relationship with Mary was too (this took up a huge part of the film). Depending on where you look, between 7 & 11 other men escaped with Mary, Will & the 2 children. Will let slip in Timor (while drunk) about who they really were & the Dutch turned them in (so, it was not the British turned up & told the Dutch who they were). Will wasn't killed in Timor (he & his son Emmanuel died of 'fever' on the voyage back to England). Charlotte died later in the voyage. Four more of the escapees arrived back in England, not just Mary & 2 men. Mary was tried ALONE upon her return & her surviving companions were tried later.Why oh why, when people make films made 'based on a true story' do they not stick to the real story? Why do they have to be glamorised or sexualised at all? If it's good/interesting enough to tell why change it?

clairelouise-ridgway I haven't seen this mini series yet but from what I have seen on the trailers shown on UK TV it looks great. I do not like however that the Australians seem to think that the mini series was totally done by them, the UK network did some of it as well so the UK should be mentioned. it may of been made in Australia but it has good British cast. and is well made. so if any Australians are out there please remember that the British had a hand in making the production as well as Australia it makes me mad that a mini series that is done outside of the UK is not mentioned and only the country that it is being made is mentioned. but I think the British will love this mini series as well as the Australian's did.