Coastal Railways with Julie Walters

[whole diary]

[grahame]

Channel 4
Sun 26 Nov, 8pm
Episode 1

http://www.channel4.com/programmes/coastal-railways-with-julie-walters

About the programme
Actor Julie Walters rides the UK^▸ (United Kingdom)'s most beautiful coastal railways, from Scotland to Cornwall

[Thatcham Crossing]

One has to hope the St Ives Branch will feature!

And Dawlish Warren to Teignmouth.

[ChrisB]

West Highland Railway is episode 1, so I reckon you may need to wait until the last episode, close to Christmas

[chuffed]

Dame on a train article in current Radio Times, St Erth to St Ives is certainly one of her jolly japes emulating the blessed St Michael of Portaloo.

[Surrey 455]

West Highland Railway is episode 1, so I reckon you may need to wait until the last episode, close to Christmas

10th December seems to be the date.

DOCUMENTARY: Coastal Railways with Julie Walters
On: Channel 4 (4)   
Date: Sunday 10th December 2017 (starting in 18 days)
Time: 20:00 to 21:00 (1 hour long)

Julie boards the famous Great Western Railway, as she heads down to Cornwall. She stops first at Torquay, on the English Riviera, where she fondly recalls childhood holidays. At Paignton, Julie boards the heritage steam line to Kingswear and its allegedly haunted castle. In the fishing village of Polperro, Julie investigates smugglers' tales and joins the RNLI on a practice run off St Ives. And in Penzance, she meets the extraordinary cake-makers at Peboryon Cakes, whose amazing creations can cost thousands. At the end of a packed trip, Julie catches the sleeper night train back to London.
(Part 3 of 4, Subtitles, Audio Described, Episode 3)
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Marked By: 'Category: Documentary' marker
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Excerpt taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from http://www.getdigiguide.tv/?p=1&r=51610

Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.

[JayMac]

emulating the blessed St Michael of Portaloo.

Who gets some gentle ribbing from Dame Julie in the trailer.

[bobm]

The week in between (3rd December) she goes to the north east.  Stopping in Newcastle, Berwick, Alnmouth and Alnwick before continuing to Edinburgh.

[froome]

the blessed St Michael of Portaloo.

who is speaking in Frome this coming Sunday, should anyone wish to spend an evening with him... 

[Red Squirrel]

Watched the first episode on All 4 last evening. Well, I say that - I watched the first segment, thinking 'Surely this must get better?', then I started doing the crossword to relieve the tedium, and about halfway through the third bit I gave up and went to bed. Shan't bother with any more.

[rogerw]

I watched it all the way through, if only for the scenery.  However it suffered from the problem you get in many productions nowadays in that the constant, fairly loud, background music made the dialogue difficult to hear. Documentary type programmes do NOT need background music when people are speaking

[chuffed]

I used the subtitles to complement the commentary and didn't find the music/dialogue too bad. Some of the music choices were intriguing to say the least...still wondering what Swinging Safari by Bert Kaempfert had to do with the port of Mallaig. I found the camera work excellent... drones seemed to have consigned wobblies, fast mo and out of focus shots as cheap gimmicks. Scenery shots all now  seem to be super smooth and slow in full colour saturation mode.

[trainer]

I had no issues with the sound and generally find music an aid to moving images, but it is a 'marmite' split in opinion I think. Overall I liked the unchallenging nature of the programme and I do enjoy most things Julie Walters does. I suppose the main problem C4 had was jumping onto a moving bandwagon at the end of a train of railway docs on BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) and C5. What new to do?  Sadly little original was said, but the West Highland Line is very photogenic and the delight of the presenter at discovering it pleasant enough.

I felt the continuity was better than the Portillo and Tarrant series, but with fewer trains and types of train on the line, it is probably easier.  We'll see if that changes.

In summary, a satisfactory watch for the general viewer.