Karry Best movie of this year hands down!

Claysaba Excellent, Without a doubt!!

TaryBiggBall It was OK. I don't see why everyone loves it so much. It wasn't very smart or deep or well-directed.

Invaderbank The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

baldrickadder I have just tonight starting watching this, since my childhood. Now I was only young when I was first allowed this, I think maybe around thirteen. At that time it was all about the phrases " I'll hav alv" " sambo" "nignog" " honkey" "snowflake" etc.As so rightly stated often by other reviews, it is not racist in the slightest. Eddie did tend to come off worse, but always came across as ignorant and bigoted. Did it make me racist, not all. In fact this show perhaps embedded the pointlessness of being racist and the stupidity of racist people. It is also not so far fetched as one might imagine. It's set up in the north of England, I lived up north, Yorkshire, in a town with a large Asia population. They was a lot of prejudice about. One example, when the holidays came, a lot of the kids would go what they called " paki bashing". Even my dad was a racist, though I would rather prefer to say ignorant, perhaps still is. I am thankful of this show, it showed me that people are people and race and skin shade should not be a barrier. There's good and bad in everyone. Actually I think the powers that be, need us to have prejudice against each other.* not word for word but was a line Bill said in series 1 episode 3. Eddie had been his normal ignorant self.This would have gone over my head in my youth, although I might not have seen it before.Still funny as I remembered, but perhaps for very different reasons this time around.

glenn-aylett Now let the PC police shoot me, and I know Love Thy Neighbour has as much chance as being shown on peak time television again as Blyth Spartans winning the European Cup, but I didn't think it was a bad show and was quite amusing.In the early seventies Till Death Do Us Part was a massive hit on the BBC, where a white working class Tory put the world to rights every week and usually got into blazing rows over issues such as race an the permissive society with his more progressive daughter and son in law. Audience figures of over 20 million persuaded ITV that they needed a rival and commissioned Vince Powell, famous for writing scripts on Coronation St in the sixties and creating a string of sit com hits, to come up with a rival to Till Death.Love Thy Neighbour was ITV's answer. Basically Alf Garnett was replaced by Eddie Booth ( Jack Smethurst), a similarly downwardly mobile bigoted white man, but with one difference, he was a staunch Labour union man who was bigoted because he saw blacks as undermining pay and conditions at work. Not surprisingly when a Tory voting black couple moved next door he was less than pleased, especially as they seemed to be better off than him. Thus the scene was set for the most controversial, and one of the most popular sitcoms, of all time.Typically an episode would start with Eddie trading insults with Bill Reynolds, his black neighbour, morning, sambo would be followed with morning, white honkey, and should Bill( Rudolph Walker) catch Eddie eyeing up his attractive wife, then all hell would break loose. However, both wives got on and often acted as peacemakers between the two. Also memorable was the elderly shop steward, Jacko, who was quite friendly to Bill, and his catchphrase I'll have an arf became popular.Love Thy Neighbour was quite amusing for its time and watching an episode where Bill buys a Triumph sports car and Eddie buys a £ 10 banger to try and compete( the doors fall off as soon as the car starts) is hilarious. However, being an ITV show, those expecting Alf Garnett style rants will be disappointed as for all the racist names are used frequently, the humour is gentler than the Alf Garnett variety and there are few of the political dogfights that made Till Death so amusing. However, Vince Powell did a nice role reversal as Eddie Booth, apart from on race, is rather to the left of Alf Garnett and Bill Reynolds is his polar opposite politically.I would recommend Love Thy Neighbour to anyone who wants to see what amused us in the seventies and how the comedy climate has changed in the last 40 years.

sprinkle89 I recently began watching this series at school for media. Though it is hard to watch this from a modern (2007) point of view, you have to remember that lots of things that we see as being politically and socially incorrect for this day and age, taken back 30 years, would have been considered the norm. Eddie Booth, the predominant white male, is a comical representation of the (then) typical, white union member. Joan Booth is the typical white housewife, bending to her husband's every need by having dinner on the table when he gets home and having the house tidy. (Remember this was before the Feminist movement in the UK.) Bill Reynolds, the predominant black male, is a representation of the incoming black community of the early 1970's. Barbie Reynolds is very much seen in the same way as Joan, as a typical housewife, though is presented as being more sexual that Joan, who sees sex as being a chore every Wednesday and Saturday night. I originally had a problem watching this series because of all the racist slurs etc. but then, I took a step back and instead of watching it from a 2007 p.o.v, watched it as though I was living in the time. After you realise that, in the early 70's this would not have been seen as racist, it was just showing the dominant social value of the time, this programme is much more enjoyable...Even if you do eventually have to do an exam on it...

Stephen Bailey I absolutely loved this show when I was a kid in the early/mid 1970s and was interested to see it running on an Australian network several years ago. I imagined it would have dated badly and no longer seem funny, but no, it's still hilarious. The format of Love Thy neighbour was quite simple. It explores the culture clash and constant bickering between bigoted working-class trade unionist Eddie (Jack Smethurst) and his upwardly mobile Black neighbour played by Rudolph Walker. Their wives constantly act as both 'straight men' and referees in the battles between Bill and Eddie. Was it racist? That's the question everyone asks. I'm confident in saying, no. Eddie often refers to Bill as "sambo" or "nig-nog", but then Bill calls Eddie a "white honky" just as often. Either both sides are guilty, or neither, and I don't see anything nasty or 'dark' in these jibes. Eddie's not hostile to Bill because he's Black, he's hostile because he's JEALOUS of him and in 9 out of 10 episodes it's Eddie who comes off worse. I particularly loved the episode where Bill convinces Eddie he's the victim of a voodoo spell and has him dancing - naked - round a tree at midnight yelling "pinky ponky, me white honky". I grew up in a 99% White town and my abiding memory of Love Thy neighbour is how beautiful Nina Baden-Semper was. I had quite a 'crush' on her as a pimply youth. I don't know what became of this lovely talented lady or Jack Smethurst, but Kate Williams (Eddie's wife) and Rudolph Walker remain familiar faces on British TV. They both have current roles in 2 of our most popular 'soaps'. The humour in Love Thy Neighbour was always the stupidity of Bill and Eddie's prejudices, so I think it presents an ANTI-racist message. Sadly, that's not much of a defence in the Britain of 2004. BBC2 recently had a major show in several parts to find "Britain's Favourite Sit-com" and Love Thy Neighbour was completely airbrushed out. To quote the Amon Goeth character in Schindlers List: "It never happened". That's a shame because it was funny and extremely popular at the time. it also showed that Black British characters can be attractive, successful and get the upper hand. we take this for granted now, but it was a brave thing to portray 30 years ago. It's worth watching, IF you ever get the chance to see it.