Office, The Series One (UK)
Contains all six episodes from the first series
Certificate: 15
Running Time: 180 mins
Retail Price: £19.99
Release Date:
Content Type: TV Series
Synopsis:
Winner of Best Sit-com & Best Comedy drama at the 2002 Royal TV Society, this six-part comedy series is set in a Slough paper merchants.
Episode 1: David Brent learns that his branch of the paper merchants might be closed down. But he promises his staff, that under his regime there will be no redundancies.
Episode 2: Donna arrives on work experience. But her first day at work is dominated by a dirty picture of her boss that`s been e-mailed around the office.
Episode 3: It`s Tim`s birthday. But it`s also the annual quiz night. Will Brent and Finchy be able to beat the young pretenders Tim & Ricky?
Episode 4: Rowan, a management consultant, has come to Wernham Hogg to give the staff a special training day.
Episode 5: Even though some of the staff may be made redundant, Brent decides to take on a new secretary. Naturally, he chooses the prettiest woman.
Episode 6: It`s judgement day on whether the office is to be downsized...
Special Features:
`How I Made The Office` documentary, specially produced by Ricky Gervais, Stephen Merchant and key cast members which includes out-takes, Pilot and pre-Pilot footage (40 mins)
Full-length Peter Pervis staff training video (as featured in Epsiode 4)
Interactive menu
Scene access
Video Tracks:
Widescreen Letterbox 1.78:1
Audio Tracks:
Dolby Digital Stereo 2.0 English
Subtitle Tracks:
English
Directed By:
Stephen Merchant
Ricky Gervais
Starring:
Ricky Gervais
Distributor:
BBC
Your Opinions and Comments
If you were to explain to someone who had not seen The Office that it was a sitcom filmed documentary like following workers at a Slough paper merchants, usually in the office, occassionaly down the pub, they`d probably say that it sounded like the worst show to hit our screens since Eldorado. Boy would they be wrong. This is comedy at it`s best, the writing is immense, the characters are excellence personified and the acting, especially that of Gervias as the boss, David Brent, is to a fan of comedy what Zinedine Zidane is to a fan of football. Excquisite. Brent is one of the funniest men to walk this Earth, he has had me in stitches more times than I care to remember, with his so called witty comments that always backfire and his quick thinking comments that shwo that Gervais and Merchant are delightful writers. The Office is a must have DVD. The documentary featured on Disc 2 is hilarious, regarding how the programme was made with interviews wiht key players. Plus deleted scenes etc make The Office a DVD that cannot not be in your collection. Get it now!
If there is one thing us Brits can do well, it`s classic comedy. Even our lowlier sitcoms are far and away better than even the `top` US offerings. If Will and Grace is the prime source of US comedy, I dread to think the concepts the studios reject. Back to The Office, this is just a perfect well observed slice of office life, and is pure genius. It just revels in all the monotonous everyday things that happen, and twists them a little to make them funny. The whole cast is wonderful, and you really recognise the characters and relate them to someone in real life. I myself feel for Tim, as I realised very quickly he is quite similar to me. There are no end of comic gems throughout the six part series, and it will take you serveral viewings to see them all. It isn`t to everyones taste, and many just don`t get it, probably because it doesn`t have a laughter track and the brash American humour present in more prime time series on BBC1 such as My Family. What Merchant and Gervais have done here is written a cracking script, got a cracking cast and made a cracking series.
VIDEO
For something that has a documentary feel to it, this is pretty damn good picture quality. It`s even in Widescreen! The only time any grain is really evident is in the scenes in Chasers Nightclub, but I doubt a lot could be done about this as this is what the picture was like on TV.
AUDIO
Only stereo, but it really doen`t require anything else. It is almost entirely dialogue driven, except for the training day, where Brent gets his guitar out. Everything is perfectly cleatr and audiable.
EXTRAS
It`s a two disc set, but there isn`t that much on it. Some fantastic menus on both discs continue the feel that office life is boring, and they are perfect, and cheap probably! The only extra on disc 1 is an Easter Egg that is a longer version of the Freelove song by Brent. A classic that would go down very well as a Comic Relief song I reckon. Onto disc 2, and there are several, high quality deleted scenes, and a brilliant 45 min documentary that covers all of the making of the first series. It contains lots of brilliant footage and some talking heads interviews with the cast. There is Outakes aplenty, and some more deleted scenes are hidden in there, as well as footage from the Pilot, which would have been a nice extra in it`s entirety. You also get a good idea that the character Brent is just Ricky Gervais, and not a creation. A nice, if small selection of extras, only missing a cast/director commentary, which would have been great.
The show revolves around an evil boss who embodies every bad and annoying characteristic that can be found in a boss. He thinks he is smart and witty, but actually he is annoying and out of touch making for a miserable work experience for all the office drones that work for him.
You have to see this movie, you`ll be quoting it for months.