Piece Of Cake - The Complete Series [DVD] [1988]

Piece of Cake is an awesome mini series that was slated by purists when it came out. However, it features wonderful flying a good story line. In this you will get a potted history of when Britain stood alone with its Commonwealth. Taking the viewer from when the war started, the fall of mainland Europe and the very real threat of invasion the UK faced. The characters are good and mostly likeable even Moggy in his own way. You will not see any CGI, so all the flying is real. The pilots include stalwarts of the UK airshow scene who are sadly no longer with us such as Father and Son Ray and Mark Hanna and Nick Grace. There are some low res copies of this out there, but this is a good version.

WWII fascinates me more than any other era in history. For as long as I can remember I've devoured books, documentaries, dramas, replica documents, anything I can find, and I thought I had a pretty good understanding of the subject. Then I watched this and found that my understanding had been taken up to a whole new level. I think to some extent, perception of WWII is a victim of its own propaganda, the pulling together and jolly sing-songs down the underground during air raids, and a lot of popular tv shows set during the war are comedies...Dad's Army, Allo' Allo', Goodnight Sweetheart... Piece of Cake is starkly realistic in its depiction of war and its human cost in lost life and and lasting damage, and the terrifying scale of the Luftwaffe in contrast with the RAF in the early stages of the war. It takes you into the mind of the Spitfire pilots and you wonder how they coped, but cope they did. This is an unsettling but superb series, a testimony to incredible courage.

This was a favourite book of mine back in the day and I recently reread it in Kindle edition. The chance to see the LWT series from 1988 was irresistible so I bought that too and received it yesterday and watched all six episodes in a binge session. The production, direction, script and acting are all very good and I enjoyed (almost) every moment. The series follows the major events in the book very well missing out only the parts that are not really needed for the continuity of the story. There are a few things that didn't please me as much The characters are quite often not as I imagined them or as they were portrayed in the book such as 'Moggy' Cattermole is not as nasty, air commodore Bletchley is not as avuncular, Chris Hart is not such a pain in the arsx, Yes! he was right. The other is the eye candy for the boys; the Spitfires. These are all late models that wouldn't be around in 1939 some armed with cannon even though the talk is of "Armed with 8 Browning machine guns" This didn't matter to me but I can imagine purists being outraged. The aerial photography is superb and I can imagine many people (men) watching the series just for glimpses of the Spitfires in action and becoming very excited. There is also proper love interest but it is thankfully brief. This is very good and you owe it to yourself to watch this evocation of the RAF Fighter Squadrons in the very early days of WW11

Only watched 3 episodes as it's very long but good drama set in world war 2 with a cast that eventually would have their own shows. One stand out is a young Neil Dudgeon now solving cases in Midsommer! If into war stories this is for you.

I remember watching this in the late 80s on Sunday evenings and enjoying it. I saw it on Amazon for sale and ordered it straight away. I was not disappointed. If you like Spitfires and airial photography this is for you. The story is good and portrays the pilots not in the same way as the films do. Its hard not to get pulled into the story as if you are actually with them. I would recommend this to anyone who likes war dramas. The 1st disc deals mainly with the 'phoney war' period with the 2nd disc realy dealing with the fighting. Well written,acted and directed with some fantastic airial filming i think this is a must.

There are some historical innaccuracies - Spitfires in France, but I put that down to ability to make the programme and it doesn't affect the effect. Four props and cannons as well. Dialogue is really good - the most poignant for me being "Christ no not Flash...I'm afraid so, a bit of spit on a blackboard and that's the end of it...when did he die?...Couple of hours ago, the Medics told me what it was but wasn't really listening, eh, post operational shock I think they said, three or four bullets, one of them went right through his shoulder and came out of his bum, he would have liked that, he knew an awful lot about anatomy, he was a card wasn't he? young Flash, I really thought he'd get away with it, they say that God takes care of Drunks and Loonies...well He's been working overtime these days...that's for sure, I was starting to think that old Flash was bullet proof too...I don't know but I hope to Christ this War is going to be worth it." The slow build up up from the Phoney War through to the hectic Battle of Britain seems to me to be really realistic. What really spooks me are the B&W stills at the beginning of the episodes and then seeing the characters in the episodes. We have all seen the B&W pics from the period, monochrome people - this gives them a reality, how they felt, acted, their sarcasm, sense of humour, how they fought and died. These Warriors will be compared in the future with the Spartans at the Battle of Thermopylae.

Watched the series many years ago because my father was a pilot during World War II and enjoyed it then. During this lockdown with little interesting to watch on telly, I ordered the DVD. So fantastic! Interesting to watch again and seeing several of the little known actors at the time who now have achieved fame, like Neil Dudgeon who is brilliant in this series as well as in Midsomer Murders. This is a series to watch and be awestruck at the courage of those who flew Spitfires to save Great Britain. It will break your heart and swell you with pride.

a good representation of the book

Arrived promptly and quality exceeded expectations, thoroughly satisfied

Situé lors des débuts de la seconde guerre mondiale, ce téléfilm quasi inconnu en France raconte l'histoire d'une escadrille anglaise volant sur spitfire En France pensant la "drole de guerre" et ensuite en Angleterre, on suit la vie et les aventures de ce groupe de jeunes hommes avec leur enthousiasme, leur cynisme parfois, leur courage toujours malgré les pertes qui vont en augmentant Et quel plaisir de voir (et d'entendre) les sublimes spitfire sans leurs dogfight avec les Me109......

Quick shipping, item as described

"Piece of cake", based on the book of the same name by Derek Robinson, is a faithful translation of the novel in most respects. The major difference between book and series is that "Hornet Squadron" flies hurricanes in the book. In the series they have spitfires, and here there's another point which bothered me - they are not flying the correct version of the spit!! In 1939 - 40 they would have had Mark 1's. These people have what look like Mark 5 or even 9's. The Me109's are not the correct version, either....If you can overlook that, the flying sequences are nicely done - lost of elegant flypasts. The characters are well drawn and the acting very good. My only complaints are at the technical level outlined above.