THE THORN BIRDS: THE MISSING YEARS (1996)

STARS: Richard Chamberlain, Amanda Donahoe, Simon Westaway, Julia Blake, Zach English, Olivia Burnett, Robert Taylor, Jack Thompson, Maximilian Schell.

DIRECTOR: Kevin James Dobson. DURATION: 200mins.

SYNOPSIS: Archbishop Ralph de Bricassart returns to Australia and Drogheda after becoming disillusioned with the Catholic Church's motives during World War Two. While there, his beloved Meggie loses custody of their son Dane to her estranged husband Luke O'Neill - who believes he is the boy's father. Ralph attempts to help Meggie win back Dane - but of course, there's time for one last tryst first...

RC PLAYS: Ralph de Bricassart.

More sex, priests and sheep for Chamberlain. Following a series of what could at best be described as average projects, the actor returned to familiar ground as errant priest Ralph de Bricassart in a new drama set during World War Two - a period missing from the original.

Unfortunately, apart from Richard, nobody else from the previous mini-series chose to reprise their roles. Instead, Amanda Donahoe took over from Rachel Ward as Meggie, with a whole bunch of other new faces taking the places of Bryan Brown, Jean Simmons and the rest of the cast.

Filming was something of a nightmare. The set, specially built for a massive $750,000 in Queensland, Australia, was troubled by freak weather conditions from the start - including a massive thunderstorm which ruined a scene being filmed at the time which was meant to be set in the middle of a terrible drought. Fierce winds also tore down a behind-the-scenes area, while Zach English (Dane) suffered the embarrassment of being targeted by a rather annoyed sheep: "It started slamming me into fences," he grumbled.

Amanda Donahoe found shooting one particular stunt rather hair-raising. It involved riding a horse on a treadmill device which is designed to make the process of filming such potentially dangerous feats much easier. "It's supposed to be safer because the horse is in a more controlled situation," recalled the actress. "But that has got to be one of the scariest things I've ever done."

Perhaps all these problems were all down to 'Colleen's Curse'. Yes, once again Ms McCullough, author of the original novel, felt she had to stick her oar in, just as she had 13 years before - eventhough she'd neither read the script nor seen the finished result.

"The first TV series was terrible, and I figure this one will be ghastly," claimed the author on its release. "I didn't write ANY of it! What on earth could they find to write about, since I covered all that I did by killing everybody off anyway?"

Chamberlain was having none of it. "I'm sorry, but nobody has ever forced Colleen McCullough, a strong and intelligent woman, into anything," stormed the actor. "She didn't like the first mini-series, which I thought was brilliant. So naturally she's going to be upset about this one, on which she hasn't been consulted at all."

However, Ms McCullough did have a point. Why bother trying to match the excellence of the original, surely anyone involved would be on a hiding to nothing? Well, money was an obvious factor. If the 'midquel' (as Chamberlain nicknamed it) made half as much cash as its predecessor, then the producers would be onto a winner - and Richard would have a much needed hit project.

In reality, The Thorn Birds: The Missing Years was a massive disappointment. For anyone unfamiliar with the novel and original min-series, then this follow-up is fine. It's well acted and the storyline is interesting with an interesting script. But - and it's a big but for fans - it's often quite excrutiating viewing. It simply doesn't fit in with what went on before. In fact, the only good thing about it is seeing Chamberlain back on familiar ground and looking remarkably fit and well at age 60.

This new flock of Thorn Birds should have had its wings clipped.

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