Best movie of this year hands down!

What a waste of my time!!!

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

Your blood may run cold, but you now find yourself pinioned to the story.

I've never actually read a Phil Rickman novel, although I have had one sitting on the shelf for years and years, but I'm a big fan of the supernatural mystery genre - slow-burning delights written by the likes of Barbara Erskine (a favourite) amongst others. I sat down to watch this ITV miniseries adaptation of one of his books to see what I was missing.Not a lot, as it transpires. MIDWINTER OF THE SPIRIT is a typically clichéd, cheap-feeling piece of ITV drama that doesn't have an original bone in its body. A cast of boring characters go through the paces in a story about a sinister conspiracy to attack the Church, but it's all so humdrum and irrelevant that you won't really care.I like Anna Maxwell Martin (TV's NORTH AND SOUTH) but her protagonist, Merrily Watkins, is dull, down-mouthed, and mean-spirited. Hardly the kind of character you can get behind and care about, then. The supporting cast includes familiar faces like Kate Dickie (PROMETHEUS) doing a boring cop routine, and David Threlfall (who constantly seems to be trying very hard to get away from his SHAMELESS character) but they're pretty much wasted. Some of the supernatural stuff, which is very limited in terms of screen time, hints at quality, but this is a far cry from stuff like BBC's APPARITIONS. Instead we get at least half the running time spent on boring mother/teenage daughter melodrama, stuff that belongs in a soap opera and not here.

This new ITV drama is set in rural Herefordshire where vicar Merrily Watkins has recently been made a deliverance minister; better known as an exorcist. She hasn't been in the post for long when the police as for her opinions when a man is found crucified in woodland; she is understandably shocked but doesn't see how she can help. Later she is asked to attend a dying man in the hospital; the nurses are afraid to go near him and as he dies Merrily senses an evil presence as he grips her hand so hard that he draws blood. After this she has a feeling of his presence and starts to believe that she is out of her depth. If this wasn't enough her daughter is becoming more and more estranged after meeting another, slightly older, girl who turns out to be the dead man's daughter. If she is to save her daughter and ultimately the local cathedral she, and her mentor Huw Owen will have to find the connection between current events and events that happened there in the Middle Ages.Not having read any of the books on which this series was based, I can't say how true this was to the original works but as a stand-alone TV series I found it rather enjoyable. There is a good creepy atmosphere throughout and the cast do a solid job. Anna Maxwell Martin is very good as Merrily; nicely depicting somebody who knows they are out of their depth and rabidly losing control of the things that matter most to her. David Threlfall is equally good as Huw. The story progresses at a decent pace and ultimately reaches a gripping conclusion that both wrapped up the story and left certain details open enough for further series if ITV want to make more. Overall an effective and atmospheric chiller that made a nice change from more conventional mysteries.

Good supernatural drama these days on TV is as rare as Hen's teeth, as the saying goes. Well done to ITV for presenting new and original drama such as this which the BBC has long given up doing. I didn't previously know about the novels upon which this series was based. In any event, there is a real hunger, I am sure, for non-formulaic supernatural/crime drama and I do hope to see another series.All the performances were top-notch and the production values were good. For those who have belief in these things, the fate of the world is not determined by sociological forces but by what perhaps the Middle Ages more clearly saw as the eternal struggle between Good and evil.

What have they done to Lol, the character in the book has long black hair and is always too pale? I suppose they'll change Ethel the cat into a Staffordshire Pit Bull and Gomer Perry into a seven foot American transvestite. This is set around the lovely countryside of Herefordshire, Ludlow and all that, and ITV have almost ruined the book series which I have read from the very first. To stop any future books being spoilt I won't be watching any more of this first series, nor will I watch any future series that ITV make. Keep out of it Irene or they'll turn you into a kilted Scot, and I did want to watch Jane grow up.