Down to Earth Series One   Starring: Pauline Quirke, Warren Clarke, Toby Ross-Bryant, Ellie Beaven and Alexandra Stone Acorn Media UK RRP: £19.99 AV9701 Certificate: PG Available 01 June 2009

Faith Addis is an inner-city schoolteacher with three children, two dogs and her husband, Brian, to look after. When Faith learns that Brian's florist shop is failing, mainly because of a sizeable debt to the taxman, he drops a bombshell on her - he would like to move to the country, buy a smallholding and grow his own flowers...

Down to Earth is based on the books by Faith Addis about her real life experiences. The series ran from 2000 - 2005 but over the course of the show's run the Addis family were replaced twice. Series One is by far the best in the show's run - being more of a drama than a mini soap - which is what it eventually started to resemble.

Pauline Quirk and Warren Clarke play Faith and Brian Addis as they move from London to Devon when Brian's florist business fails. Brian realises that the only way to get out of this unscathed is to sell up and move into the country, where they can buy a premise out right. Realising that this has been a long-held dream of Brian's Faith agrees to give up their life in London and move to Devon. Once they have found the perfect property, everything becomes a challenge, including a visit to the local market to buy their first cow.

On top of the stresses of moving house, the Addis family have to contend with trying to build a successful business. The girls have new schools to settle into and their son Marcus needs to find his purpose.

This two-disc collection features the first six episodes of the show. We follow the Addis family as they sell up and hunt for a cheap property; the girls struggle to fit in at their new schools, the two elder children find love, Brian's business ideas constantly fail, and they have to deal with masked thieves who steel a neighbour's tractor and their pony.

As Brian was a successful florist previously, I did have a hard time believing that he wouldn't have known when to pick the flowers, or that he needed to stagger their planting. That's just a slight nit-pick, but otherwise this is an entertaining series.

Extras are a little on the poor side. All we get are text based Production Notes and a Picture Gallery.

8

Darren Rea