Love Thy Neighbour: The Complete Series

Totally worn out after only 4 episodes i was laughing so much that i was crying. Never laughed so much in years. So refreshing to watch a comedy from my childhood, without the crude rude swearing and disgusting jokes of nowadays, without gratuitous sex or violence. Just innuendos. Good innocent fun. Lots of witty stories showing up how stupid prejudices are, prejudices of politics, race and with flitterings of seriousness for instance showing womens lack of rights. Story of 2 (sensible) ladies who get on, have a cup of tea, while their husbands try to get one over each other... but in end they defend & support each other - and have a beer in pub. The series uses made up words to insult each other, which couldnt be accused of racist because they were made up, were talking 50 years ago! i'd never heard of them before this program,.. which proves what my math teacher once showed us.... he said a word is offensive because of HOW its used, not because of the actual word.... he proved this by applying this to the word "paper" saying after a coupla weeks we'd see it as a swear word!! .... Weeks later my sister asked me to pass her some paper... "Dont swear at me!" I exclaimed!! Examples- spoilers!! "Thats it were moving ".... "is this about them being black?".... "no, there ruddy conservatives!" "What would sean connery do with you?." "Anything he wants!" "I just heard dumbo talking to mickey mouse, there gonna hijack snow white, thats me!!"

Absolutely legendary - hilarious!! Well worth every penny!

Simply this IS racist but it's reputation is constantly wheeled out by the do-gooders completely out of context. I'm too young to have watched when it actually aired but being a (retro?) fan of 70's comedy this is an extremely well written and in some places very cleverly written comedy that reflected the sentiments and feelings of the day. When will people get it through their heads that this is exactly how it was back then and you cannot apply todays ideology to a programme that is almost 40 years old. The language used is again, of it's day. This language is not tolerated in this day and age but 40 years ago it is language that people used in the context presented in this programme. Finally, having watched it through (and found it very funny) it seems that people have selective memories. They seem to only remember the 'white' guy taking a racist stance against the 'black' guy. Well, it isn't like that at all. The 'black' guy is simply just as bad as the 'white' guy and THAT IS THE VERY PREMISE OF THE SHOW!!! The impression I got was that the underlying commentry is that the times were changing and the behaviour of the time from ANY race was wrong and it simply doesn't get anyone anywhere. I'm a child of the 80's who loves comedy from the 70's and 80's. If you can get your head around the fact that these were different times with different views and ideas (which were the norm back then) then you'll find a comedy gem here with great performances from all involved. Highly recommended.

I'm old enough to vaguely remember this series from my childhood. I'd only seen a few episodes, but when I saw it available on DVD and including all eight series along with the movie, I just had to get it. Nostalgia is an odd thing. It can be everything you remembered or it can fall short. I am happy to report that Love Thy Neighbour is every bit as good, if not better, than I remembered. To those born in the mid 60's like me, the first nostalgia trip is when you play an episode and the old Thames television logo appears. Viewing this series with modern sensibilities can make for a bit of a culture shock and I found myself wincing a little, shocked at the racist epithets casually spoken by the white protagonist, Eddie Booth. Mind you, I had the same, more pronounced, shock when getting used to the foul language used in the brilliant Orange is the New Black series. however, once you're over that shock, the series is very enjoyable. Contrary to what some people may think, Love Thy Neighbour actually sees Eddie Booth's character being bested by a far smarter, level headed and sensible black neighbour, Bill Reynolds, played by the superb Rudolph Walker. Eddie Booth is shown time and again to be the ignorant bigot he is, so this series portrays racism, but it's the black character that comes off best most of the time. In so doing. he shows Eddie to be the racist fool he is. Comedy has been slowly diluted today in order to avoid being offensive to everyone. Part of humour is making fun of the differences between us all, and in that way, we can learn about ourselves and explore issues too sensitive to be dealt with outside of comedy. If you can't do that, then life is far too serious. We have to all learn to laugh at ourselves before laughing at others. If you look at another TV show of that period, Rising Damp, it also portrays Leonard Rosseter's character, Mr Rigsby, as ignorant more than racist. Also, like Love Thy Neighbour, it has the black character of that show, Philip, played by Don Warrington, running circles around Rigsby, being far more educated, intelligent and sophisticated than Rigsby ever could. So, these comedies, in my view, aren't "racist", but rather portray ignorant white characters who are gotten the better of because of their racism and ignorance. DVD transfer quality is excellent despite the age of the content, so top marks for the team that did the remastering. This show is a product of its time and it's unfair to judge it by modern sensibilities. Relax, stop being offended and simply have a laugh.

yes it did, , good quality on dvd for the series age, when it was first shown, I think i was a few months old, plus I had to wait a few years to watch it on tv when it was re-shown, how things have changed for the worse, back in them days you could make light hearted fun of it (you say someone was the black as the ace of spades and it meant that there face or clothing was absolutely dirty with playing in the soil and people could get away with it because it was ok & nobody got upset coz they knew what it meant), but now days you can`t fart without upsetting someone white or of a different race, the world is going to ruin. Anyway, it was nice to watch it again for the light hearted humour it was made in by the people who stared in it.

If you remember this from on screen in the 70's you know what to expect. It is based on the difficult time in the early to mid 70's when White British people struggled in their acceptance to the mass immigration of the Black community. They live next door to each other, the women get on and the men don't. The men also work together the White male character is portrayed as being quite working class and lesser educated, and continually calls his counterpart a "nig nog" and Sambo. Whilst the Black Male character is scripted as being more refined and well read; he is also very capable of racism though; he refers to his opposite as a "honky" or "snowflake". Whilst being very popular during the early to mid 70's it did make rise to a great deal of criticism due to it's complete disregard to social cohesion and acceptance, if you were to study the episodes you do see racism on both parts. This boxset includes all 7 series which ran from 1972-1976, it did create similar controversy as did "till death do us part" due to the (in some cases) harsh racist comments and actions. This will be something you either love and find hillarious or you hate and would find offensive. If it was to be aired on television these days it would have a continuity announcement warning of the likelihood to offence that may be caused. I would recommend that you ask someone who knows you well and that remembers it as to whether you would enjoy this.

Popular 1970's show that was aired at 7pm Monday evenings. When first watching you are shocked because of the racist comments/Jokes by todays standards but once you watch more episodes you realise it's both ways & two friends having a laugh about each others skin colour. The white guy is the bigot who gets his come uppance all the time. If your easily offended don't watch. The political jokes are dated as I don't know what they are talking about. All in all after after the general shock of the humour of the day a enjoyable funny show.

This does take the mickey out of racism and politics and you certainly couldn't get away with this now, but the 70s are in full play here, and the chemistry between both separate families when looked upon as individuals is very charming. The relationship between both Eddie and Bill always ends up turning friendly, even brotherly, when they all congregate at the local pub in the evenings, making it seem like their feud is placed on the back-burner. All in all, it's a charming look at life in the 70s and if you've lived through it as a younger person, you'll certainly be taken back - the wallpaper, furniture, phones, TV sets - just sit back and enjoy!