by Allan Fish
(UK 2008-2009 590m) DVD2
The spirit of Calgacus
p Richard Downes, Tim Niel, Sarah Barclay, Clara Glynn d Tim Niel, Andrew Downes, Sarah Barclay, Clara Glynn, Bill MacLeod w Neil Oliver ph Neville Kidd ed Jonathan Seal m Paul Leonard-Morgan art Ewen Duncan presented by Neil Oliver
Considering the reputation of British television documentaries dealing with history, art and/or politics worldwide, it may seem unthinkable that a time may come when those series would be a thing of the past. John Romer has been retired from the screen for over a decade, while David Starkey, Simon Schama and Michael Wood now qualify as pensioners. We’re reliant on a new generation of presenters to take their place. Only a year or so ago, I remember Neil Oliver tweeting that whoever took the presenting of a remake of Kenneth Clark’s Civilisation, as had been mooted, would be receiving a poisoned chalice. Only someone sensible enough to refuse the offer to be considered.
Oliver is one of a new generation, a historian broadcaster of no small charisma, and one of a select group of historians, scientists and art historians making splashes on TV screens in the 21st century. Brian Cox has reinvented science on TV with Wonders of the Universe and Solar System, Robert Bartlett did The Normans, Michael Scott gave us a three part treatise on the Greek playwrights, Wlademar Januszczak has been in raptures over Dark Age bling and Islamic arches, while Richard Miles and especially Bettany Hughes – on her moped, eulogising over The Spartans – have given the ancient world a fresh spin. All have produced excellent, informative programmes, but still it’s Oliver’s A History of Scotland that wins a place over them.
Perhaps the subject has something to do with it. At a time when Scotland’s sense of identity was being championed and questioned again in the years leading up to the referendum, there was perhaps more need of it than ever before. In Schama’s A History of Britain, he’d paid scant attention to Scotland, popping north of the border only really for anecdotes about Mary Stuart and Robert the Bruce. Other histories likewise seemed to subjugate the Scottish monarchy to the English equivalent in a way that would have pleased Edward I. Oliver’s series was an attempt to right that wrong.
It’s a historical landscape as vast as its physical, not that Oliver and the crew don’t take advantage of the latter, with countless vast panoramic sweeps that may seem superfluous to storytelling, but certainly add visual panache in an age of short attention spans. Yet it’s rather in the dynamic presenting style that Oliver is unique. All the other academics listed above have the confidence to speak directly to the camera and do so at ease as the camera leisurely pans along with them. Oliver may do largeee snatches of dialogue to camera, but he prefers to make the camera – and thus, by proxy, his audience – follow him, as he moves away, often turning over his shoulder and on occasion walking backwards to beckon the viewer. It’s as if to say, “come with me, let me show you this…” rather than “let me tell you this”, and while it may alienate some of the old guard grumbling online, it’s a refreshing change.
All of which would count for little were the story Oliver relates not so engaging. He’s aware of various documentary and dramatic antecedents and as he discusses the ruination of Scotland in modern times in the closing episodes, when we get a reminder of a famous victory over the auld enemy at rugby at Murrayfield in 1991 (one can hear the immortal words of Bill McLaren even now), one half expects to see clips from seventies plays like The Cheviot, the Stag and the Black Black Oil or even Peter McDougall’s Just Another Saturday, and they wouldn’t have been out of place (nor would Watkins’ Culloden in the episode dealing with the Clearances). It’s a deeply patriotic yet crucially unbiased piece about a nation often struggling to find its own identity which stands, despite some excellent series about Ancient and Celtic Britain, as Oliver’s finest ten hours to date. One to these eyes even more essential viewing from an educational standpoint for prejudiced viewers south of the border than north of it.
