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Look Around You : Complete BBC Series 1 [2002]

RRP: £15.99
Our Price: £8.98 (subject to change)

Editorial
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

Very Funny .
Review date: 2008-03-17 Rating: 10 out of 10

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 on .

Reviews

An absolute gem
Review date: 2008-01-03 Rating: 10 out of 10

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. Each programme starts with a school clock countdown, which took me right back to the days of primary school. Each programme is ten minutes long and takes a different 'scientific' theme as its subject. There really are no words to adequately describe what a piece of film perfection this is. Everything has been thought out from the clothing and footage clips to the music and voice overs. My favourite thing is the compulsion to use dymo tape labels on everything, and if you watch carefully you will see that not all the labels are quite as they should be! It is this attention to detail that makes each programme so utterly rewarding.
It is filmed 'straight', i.e. not for obvious laughs, but this just made it more funny than ever. The extras package is good. The packaging itself is well thought out. I love everything about it.
I bought this for my husband for Christmas, and we have agreed it was the best thing that happened to us over Christmas, particularly in terms of saving us from Bond re-runs.
Buy it now while you can.

Brilliant
Review date: 2006-11-29 Rating: 10 out of 10

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!

Spoof TV has been done (not quite to death) over the last few years, but this remains unique and intelligent.

The stylistics are perfect, down to the graphics, clothes and hair-do's. This will take you back to when the teacher wheeled in the TV to watch a schools TV show.

Buy this!!!!!!
Review date: 2006-09-11 Rating: 10 out of 10

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....

"What ARE birds?.....We just don't know!"

For God's sake, if you have anything approaching a sense of humour, get Look Around You.

Bizarre but very funny
Review date: 2006-05-03 Rating: 8 out of 10

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 to be videotaped and shown in classrooms for educational purposes - that it's full genius can only be appreciated by those of us around and at school in the 1970's, or awake at night watching those hideous Open University programmes.

But luckily I was one of those people, and I I found "Look Around You" to be hysterical. The dry-as-dust delivery of the presenters and the totally bonkers ideas for educational experiments and scientific reports that populate each segment have to be seen to be believed. Each short segment passes itself off as a serious investigation into some scientific theme or other, and experiments or reports are carried out on screen to supposedly teach the viewer about various scientific facts. Of course, the facts and figures quoted or discovered during the show are all totally and hilariously fictitious, such as discussing what the highest number in the world might be, or setting a maths problem about ladies buying shoes for spiders, Sample experiments vary from the laugh-out-loud crazy to the very subtley skewed, and they include a study of ants building a miniature igloo, opening up a garden pea to extract its brain (yes it has one!), and programming a computer to compose a pop song about a mouse.

The interior studio scenes are all filmed in a clinical and stark lab setting with lots of close-ups, while the outside reports use faux grainy (or sometimes genuine recycled) 1970's stock footage. In a way, obvious ploys like getting you to laugh at bad haircuts and ugly fashions are almost overkill, but they still add extra appeal, and something to look at while you think carefully about whether "mafipulation" is a real word, or try and recall just what on earth some of the elements appearing on that Periodic Table being displayed actually were.

The narration, sets, graphics and film clips are all spot-on 1970's pastiches and the series quickly developed a cult following, albeit a small one as there are only 8 episodes and they last a tiny 10 minutes long each. Nevertheless, it did lead to a second series, which to my mind is more successful, as it spoofs "Tomorrows World", and the episodes were extended to half an hour for that format. Although this DVD is short there are some funny extras as well as a commentary by the cast and writers who are obviously very fond of the subject matter they are spoofing, and make lots of very comical remarks.

A great investment for anyone with a love for archaic British television. Anyone that "gets" it will find themselves in the fortunate position of laughing solidly throughout the whole series.

Product Details/Specifications

Actor(s):
Peter Serafanowicz

Director(s):

Recording label: 2 Entertain Video
Manufacturer: 2 Entertain Video
EAN: 5014503132224
Binding: DVD
Number of items: 1
Format: PAL,
Release date: 2003-10-13
Number of discs: 1
Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
Audience rating: Suitable for 12 years and over
Region code: 2
Running time: 80 minutes
Theatrical release date: 2002-10-10
Language: English (Original Language)

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Devoted to Popular, Cult and Retro TV

Look Around You : Complete BBC Series 1 [2002]

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