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Look Around You : Complete BBC Series 1 [2002] [DVD]
 
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Look Around You : Complete BBC Series 1 [2002] [DVD]

DVD ~ Peter Serafanowicz
4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
RRP: £15.99
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Frequently Bought Together

Look Around You : Complete BBC Series 1 [2002] [DVD] + Look Around You : Complete BBC Series 2 [DVD] + The Day Today : Complete BBC Series (2 Disc Set) [1994] [DVD]
Total RRP: £55.97
Price For All Three: £17.94

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What Do Customers Ultimately Buy After Viewing This Item?

Look Around You : Complete BBC Series 1 [2002] [DVD]
81% buy the item featured on this page:
Look Around You : Complete BBC Series 1 [2002] [DVD] 4.6 out of 5 stars (30)
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The Day Today : Complete BBC Series (2 Disc Set) [1994] [DVD]
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Product details

  • Actors: Peter Serafanowicz
  • Directors: Tim Kirkby
  • Format: PAL
  • Language English
  • Region: Region 2 (This DVD may not be viewable outside Europe. Read more about DVD formats.)
  • Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
  • Number of discs: 1
  • Classification: 12
  • Studio: 2 Entertain Video
  • DVD Release Date: 13 Oct 2003
  • Run Time: 80 minutes
  • Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (30 customer reviews)
  • ASIN: B0000AISIY
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 3,332 in DVD (See Bestsellers in DVD)

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Reviews

Amazon.co.uk Review

Look Around You is a spoof science programme that hilariously recreates both the drab, depressing air of 1970s educational television and a bygone world of tedious school science lessons. Each of the 10-minute episodes--or "Modules"--takes the form of a number of surreal and pointless experiments based on a chosen theme ranging from "Water" and "Sulphur" to "Ghosts" and "Brains".

Look Around You's humour lies not only in an absurd take on education and the impenetrable jargon of science, but also in evoking a sense of nostalgia in the viewer. In this respect the series is helped immeasurably by faultless production and attention to detail. Narrated in austere, Queen's English, using precise scientific terminology, this is a world of scratched film inserts, dubious periodic tables, cheap, synthesised music, giant hairstyles, bulky, teak-finished technology and a proliferation of DYMO labels. Each show is even prefaced by a few seconds of the "Television for Schools & Colleges" countdown clock. The tutorial format of the series is not without its problems though--it is essentially a single, plotless joke stretched to eight episodes, and there are no characters to speak of, save glimpses of the deadpan and much-maligned lab-technician (cowriter Peter Serafanowicz). Despite these shortcomings Look Around You is still a refreshingly different comedy, which is so well put together that you can almost smell the Bunsen burners while you watch.

On the DVD: Look Around You on disc comes with a sizeable and appropriately bizarre selection of extras. The superb animated menus are designed to mimic the arcane, pastel-coloured diagrams found in any well-thumbed science textbook, and even feature the background noise of what is presumably a white-coated technician shuffling around the lab. The Additional Features include the double-length "Calcium" episode, a full-length music video of the song created in the "Music" module (the surprisingly catchy "Little Mouse" by Jack Morgan, BSc), a selection of spoof pages from Ceefax and the Test Card. The different sound modes allow you to watch with or without the narration, subtitles or an entertaining commentary from the programme makers. --Paul Philpott



DVD Description

A new direction in televisual nostalgia for the seventies and eighties - a quirky spoof science series reminiscent of schools education and Open University programming.
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Customer Reviews

30 Reviews
5 star:
 (23)
4 star:
 (4)
3 star:
 (2)
2 star:
 (1)
1 star:    (0)
 
 
 
 
 
Average Customer Review
4.6 out of 5 stars (30 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

 
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Thank God I'm not the only one!, 9 Mar 2004
By A Customer
I watched Look Around You when it was on television 2 years ago, and tried in vain to get others interested in it, but the concept of "funny Open University" was just a little too weird for most of my friends.

And that's about all I can say about it: it's funny Open University. It captures exactly the tone, the process, the genre of programming for schools that I remember (avoiding) as a child and teenager. And yet, it's incredibly funny, without going "hey, look at the stupid people with their hair and clothes of the 70s" that this type of comedy usually reverts to. The comedy comes from the both the set pieces and the reverence it is obviously paying to the original programming.

The DVD itself is very good, with nice extras including the Little Mouse video in its entirety, but its the commentary that gets me every time. Listening to the commentary makes me want to hear the original soundtrack and listening to the soundtrack makes me want to hear the commentary. It's a nice vicious circle.

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27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Write that down., 26 Feb 2004
By S. J. King "zh84" (Scotland) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
Humour is a very subjective thing; I, for instance, do not find "The Office" at all funny. Whether anyone reading this will find "Look Around You" as funny as I do I can't say, but I think it's one of the finest things ever to have been broadcast, for what it is - eight ten-minute programmes. Peter Serafinowicz takes his ludicrous "experiments" absolutely seriously, and Nigel Lester's commentary similarly betrays not the slightest sign that he is reading out a spoof - even when he has to say things like "The gas was allowed to mafipulate through the water for five minutes." The programmes perfectly capture the style of those dreary Schools Programmes on science we saw in the late 70s and early 80s, and - if you didn't pay close attention - you might almost believe it was for real. Until you notice the ants building the igloo, that is. "Thanks, ants," as Nigel Lester says, politely. "Thants."

The DVD is very well presented, and allows the usual writers' and director's commentary as an alternative to the original soundtrack. From this I learned how the show was first conceived: Robert Popper and Peter Serafinowicz produced a one-off parody programme on "Calcium" basically to amuse themselves, and the BBC eventually took it up and commissioned the series we have now enjoyed. "Calcium" is included on the DVD; the interrogation of "intelligent calcium" is perhaps the highlight, though there are many other things to cherish. You also get a series of mock "Pages from CEEFAX", with news, farming, financial and sport reports which combine realism and madness very much as the programmes do; a quiz for what you have learned from each episode, with suitable punishments should you do badly; and a parody test card ending with a few seconds of animation from a cartoon that I wish went on for a whole five minutes. Until we see a complete edition of "The Hexagons", though, I just have to repeat their names - Moffaty, Gideon, Vincent, Slingsby and Wilson - to make myself laugh.

Highly recommended.

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10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Quite frankly, a work of genius, 6 Jul 2005
By Mr. L. Rose "leerose11" (UK) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   
I'd seen glimpes of this weird little series when it was originally broadcast in 2002, but only when getting ready to go out so I never really paid much attention. However, after becoming hooked to series 2 on the BBC in 2005, I looked up for any DVDs of the show and found this series available. It is very different in style and execution to the later series, but the wickedly strange humour remains the same.

Of particular note, the full music video version of "Little Mouse" in the DVD extras is, quite frankly, a work of genius.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Epic
If your school science department had a video player then odds on you'll know exactly the kind of video that this so brilliantly mocks. I laughed a lot. Highly recommended.
Published 2 months ago by Mr. J. A. Badham

3.0 out of 5 stars Hit and miss
There are some classic sketches on this DVD, but once you've watched it through once or twice the humour dissipates and you're left with something you won't watch again... Read more
Published 3 months ago by R. R. Clayton

5.0 out of 5 stars Very Funny .
Anyone who sat through the schools programmes during the 1970s -1980s will find this very funny . The mock experiments are sheer genius , and the "serious" commentary is spot... Read more
Published 20 months ago by Egbert Souse

5.0 out of 5 stars An absolute gem
This is a must buy item in my opinion. It's a steal, and very, very funny indeed. It is based around school science programmes of the seventies. Read more
Published 23 months ago by Mrs. K. A. Wheatley

5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant
I saw this on telly a few years ago and it captivated me, ten minute shorts with as much humour as some half hour shows. Fantastic! Read more
Published on 29 Nov 2006 by DangermouseZilla

5.0 out of 5 stars Buy this!!!!!!
Not much more to add to what's already been said, other than this is absolutely superb. I got mine today and (honestly) shed tears of laughter watching it.... Read more
Published on 11 Sep 2006 by S. G. Warner

4.0 out of 5 stars Bizarre but very funny
This spoof comedy series is so firmly entrenched in its origins - a very small pocket of British television history known as Programmes for Schools, which were TV shows intended... Read more
Published on 3 May 2006 by A. Griffiths

5.0 out of 5 stars Worth every star
5 star reviews are everywhere on Amazon. When you consider that 5 stars is essentially perfection - no flaws whatsoever, the best of the best, will never be bettered - it becomes... Read more
Published on 17 April 2006 by Jesus Chigley

4.0 out of 5 stars Random and very amusing
A very amusing spoof of traditional educational television programmes with a terribly English presenter, some very amateur scientific experiments and painfully funny problems for... Read more
Published on 30 Mar 2006 by Sha

4.0 out of 5 stars The DVD You should buy
Well I first saw this broadcast on UK television and I was surprised at its originality. However if you're looking for a DVD which is packed with laughter. This is not it. Read more
Published on 1 Sep 2005

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