Prisoner, The (1967)-Number 2: The Schizoid Man

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General		Extras
Category	Science Fiction	Main Menu Introduction Main Menu Audio & Animation Trailer-Original Episode Trailers Featurette-Original Portmeirion Location Footage Trailer-Series Trailer No. 2 Biographies-Cast Gallery-Photo
Rating
Year Of Production	1967
Running Time	194:35 (Case: 200)
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (9:40)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Menu
Region Coding	1,2,3,4,5,6	Directed By	Robert Asher Don Chaffey Pat Jackson Patrick McGoohan
Studio Distributor	Umbrella Entertainment	Starring	Patrick McGoohan
Case	Amaray-Transparent-Secure Clip
RPI	$29.95	Music	Ron Grainer Albert Elms Wilfred Josephs

'Who is Number 1? You are Number 6!'

    The Prisoner is an English television series made in 1966/67 which over the years has become a cult favourite, with many websites and societies devoted to it. It was controversial when it first aired because of its very different and confusing approach and especially because of its strange, surreal ending. It has been released here in Region 4 by Umbrella/AV Channel and is available either as a box set of 5 discs or as individual discs. For this reason there will be five single disc reviews followed by a box set review tying them all together, so bear with me. Each disc contains extras but the major extras are contained on Disc 5.

    The basic premise is that a high ranking government employee in London, obviously somehow involved in international espionage, decides to resign and during the credits which start most episodes, he visits his boss in an underground location to thump the desk and hand over his letter. He returns home to pack and get away from England, however, while he is doing so he is gassed and kidnapped. When he awakes he is in a strange place, called The Village, which is really a prison but without obvious guards, fences, wire or locks. He quickly learns that they want to know why he resigned and he is referred to only as Number 6 (Patrick McGoohan). Not being sure who or which side he is dealing with he refuses to tell them anything. The village accommodates many people, all with different numbers, most of whom have given up the information they held and now live as virtual automatons, following the instructions of the chief administrator, Number 2, on how to behave and react to various situations. The show follows the various attempts of Number 2 (played by various actors) to break Number 6 and get him to answer their questions. It also follows various attempts by Number 6 to escape and work out who Number 1 is. Because of Number 6's importance, Number 2's shadowy superiors will not allow him to use risky or destructive techniques to bring Number 6 to heel.

    The episodes on this disc are: (Episode descriptions will be short to avoid spoiling the episode)

1. The Schizoid Man - An excellent episode where they change Number 6's number to Number 12 in an attempt to confuse him into talking. They bring in someone else who looks like him to play Number 6. I felt this was one of the strongest episodes of the entire series but I know this is probably controversial. Number 2 is played by Anton Rodgers.
2. The General - Another interesting episode which takes a shot at the education system. A new learning method called SPEEDLEARN has been devised by someone called The General and will be run by The Professor. It will enable people to do a 3 year university degree in 3 minutes. Number 2 is played by Colin Gordon.
3. Many Happy Returns - Number 6 awakes one morning to find the village deserted, so he builds a raft and escapes back to England. He finds a woman living in his house and driving his car. He meets up with colleagues that he used to work with. To tell you any more would spoil the episode.
4. Dance of the Dead - Number 6 finds a dead body on the beach and tries to use it as a way to send a message out of The Village. Someone he knows from his old job, Dutton, arrives in The Village. There is a carnival and dance held. A strange episode and not one of the stronger ones. Number 2 is played by Mary Morris.

    Highly recommended if you don't mind having to think.

Video

    The video quality is excellent. A wonderful job has been done in restoring the video presentation. It is not without problems, however, compared to footage from the series in some of the extras and documentaries, the difference is quite amazing.

    The feature is presented in a 1.29:1 aspect ratio non 16x9 enhanced which is the original aspect ratio.

    The picture was surprisingly clear and sharp throughout considering the age of the material, with no evidence of low level noise. The shadow detail was decent but certainly nothing special.

    The colour was generally very good, however, I did notice some chroma noise from time to time.

    Considering the age and television source of the material, artefacts have been kept to an absolute minimum, but they are certainly present. From a film artefact perspective, there were occasional specks and lines, although all things considered these were quite minimal. There were also occasional jumps in the film but these were not regular and not really badly noticeable. From a film-to-video artefact perspective there was some regular mild aliasing throughout on car grilles, windows and more. There was also some edge enhancement which occurs regularly. I also noticed some tape tracking errors but these were very irregular. From an MPEG artefact perspective there was also some macro-blocking to be seen such as in the clouds in the credits and here and there during the episodes. Macro-blocking was worse on this disc than the others but still not terrible. None of these artefacts could be considered overly significant and considering the age of the original series, the overall video quality is excellent.

    There are no subtitles which is a shame.

    The layer change occurs at 9:40 in Episode 3 but is not very noticeable.
    

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    The audio quality is good and in the original mono.

    This DVD contains an English Dolby Digital 2.0 mono soundtrack encoded at 192 Kb/s.

    Dialogue was clear and easy to understand throughout. Audio sync was an issue in two episodes but was generally fine.

    The music in the series includes the excellent theme as hummed by Patrick McGoohan to Ron Grainer who then took the original idea and developed it into a full theme. Other incidental music was by Wilfred Josephs & Albert Elms. Generally, the music is excellent, weird, effective, surreal and interesting.

    The surround speakers and subwoofer were not used.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

    The significant extras are on Disc 5 but each disc also contains some other extras.

Menu

    The menu included an intro, stills, music, dialogue and the ability to select scenes and episodes.

Original Episode Trailers

    These are the original television trailers for each of the episodes on this disc, including:

• The Schizoid Man (0:59)
• The General (1:00)
• Many Happy Returns (0:59)
• Dance of The Dead (0:57)

Original Portmerion Location Footage (7:32)

    16mm footage shot to convince the studio of the location and its interesting qualities. Definitely of interest to fans.

Series Trailer No 2 (0:52)

    Original television trailer for the entire series.

Number 2 Profiles

    Text profiles for the actors who play Number 2 in these episodes; Anton Rodgers, Georgina Cookson & Mary Morris.

The Tally Ho Photo Gallery

    13 stills from the show, behind-the-scenes and publicity photos.

Case Notes

    The case includes an essay on Danger Man, the series Patrick McGoohan made before this one.

    There is censorship information available for this title. Click here to read it (a new window will open). WARNING: Often these entries contain MAJOR plot spoilers.

    I will cover the Region 4 vs Region 1 differences in the box set review as the sets are reasonably different. There is no direct comparison for each individual disc as the Region 1 set is spread over 10 discs. Smaller sets were released earlier with two discs each, however, the spread of episodes is quite different.

    The video quality is wonderful considering the source.

    The audio quality is good.

    The disc has a selection of extras which would interest fans of the show.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall