What is it about?
The article charts the changing aesthetics of television as a reflection of society’s ‘felt sense of the quality of life at a particular place and time’ (Williams, 2011: 68). It considers this through the way that the 1976 version of Bouquet of Barbed Wire is filmed, and claims that its claustrophobic tendencies and overpopulated frames reflect the taboo nature of incest at that time. The essay contrasts this with the more expansive visuals of the 2010 remake which, although deriving from improved technologies, still project more open frames and figure behaviour
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Why is it important?
The subject is timely because it typifies the current move to openness and regulation of institutions and systems, especially those concerned with child abuse and paedophilia. The changed aesthetics of the two versions of Bouquet of Barbed Wire reflect this scrutiny and laying bare of concealed, taboo subjects
Perspectives
I am interested in this drama because I remember the controversy that the first version created, and was surprised at how different the later remake was.
Dr Frances E. Pheasant-Kelly
University of Wolverhampton
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Text, Image, Audience: Adaptation and Reception of Andrea Newman'sBouquet of Barbed Wire, Journal of British Cinema and Television, January 2016, Edinburgh University Press,
DOI: 10.3366/jbctv.2016.0297.
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