WasAnnon Slow pace in the most part of the movie.

Softwing Most undeservingly overhyped movie of all time??

Ketrivie It isn't all that great, actually. Really cheesy and very predicable of how certain scenes are gonna turn play out. However, I guess that's the charm of it all, because I would consider this one of my guilty pleasures.

Leoni Haney Yes, absolutely, there is fun to be had, as well as many, many things to go boom, all amid an atmospheric urban jungle.

monolithguy I did not read the book - so went into this first episode devoid of expectations and was very pleasantly surprised. I was also a bit surprised by what seemed to be a lower than expected rating for this title on IMDB - this show, in my opinion, was a very unique and welcome addition to like Whodunits and Murder mysteries - the acting is very well done, casting fantastic, costume and set design magnificent, and the storyline is doled out in such a way as to pull you along, unwary to the end, when the fish is landed and the lines tied up. No hint of low budget here, and some fine camera work to boot. As a period piece - I find it solid and extremely absorbing - I have thus far seen 3 of the 4 shows and have been enthralled. Mr Whicher is not to be confused with Sherlock Holmes - he is a very genuine and fallible human being - he has a knack for the occupation and a natural talent for it - plus his own demons that drive him on. I think it makes for a great watch - can't help but hope that another installment may be on the horizon. Such a shame that there were only 4 episodes made.

Leofwine_draca THE MURDER AT ROAD HILL HOUSE was an excellent non-fiction crime novel which looked at a notorious murder case which took place in 19th century Victorian England. This rather derivative ITV adaptation of the novel offers a heavily fictionalised version of the story, but in adopting all of the usual clichés of the TV detective formula, it loses something in the process.I like Paddy Considine but he can do little with his titular detective character who comes across as rather flat. The viewer is left wondering why we're supposed to care about his increasingly frustrated investigations. The rest of the staging is adequate, but the director is too obsessed with getting the details right and forgets about offering any kind of stylistic touches of his own. There's no tension here, no suspense in the telling, it's just an ordinary police procedural that you watch to see what happens. THE SUSPICIONS OF MR WHICHER almost entirely lacks the gripping, page-turning quality of the book on which it is based, so it's invariably disappointing.

Neil Welch The Suspicions Of Mr Whicher is based on Kate Summerscale's book of the same name. This book is not a novel: rather it is a factual (and, if truth be told, rather dry) recounting of the facts of the case and everything relating to it (including the individuals involved) based on the original documentary evidence.The film concentrates on the case and doesn't tell us very much about the backgrounds of Mr Whicher, the Kent family, detection within the English police force and how it was viewed by the public, and so on. As such it, too, is a little dry, although the drama inherent in the story is augmented by performance drama.The film may disappoint because the conclusion is somewhat perfunctory and the "what happened afterwards", delivered at length on the course of a couple of lengthy chapters in the book, is here given over the space of three or four title cards.

Tweekums When a three-year old child is abducted from his cot and murdered in 1860 suspicion initially falls on the boy's nanny as he was in her room at the time; she however is adamant that she is innocent. When Inspector Whicher is dispatched from London to Wiltshire to take over the investigation he is inclined to believe her. His suspicion soon falls on the boy's sister Constance; the problem is he cannot find the evidence he needs and the local constabulary are less than helpful. As the case progresses Whicher becomes more and more convinced that she is guilty but the evidence that would send her to the gallows continues to elude him and on the day of the hearing to determine if Constance should stand trial it is clear that the villages are all sure of her innocence.In this day and age we are used to murder mysteries where the detectives will examine a scene and find DNA, fingerprints and tiny traces of hair before analysing them with high-tech equipment; refreshingly there is none of that here; Whicher must build a case on largely circumstantial evidence or extract a confession if he is to see the killer punished… this did lead to a rather sudden ending but as the story was based on a real case one can't really complain about its resolution. Paddy Considine put in a fine performance as Inspector Whicher and Alexandra Roach was good as his chief suspect; the sixteen-year old Constance.