The Shadow Line ...will it be as good as the danish/french?

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

..an intriguing account of Episode 1 [of 7]

Telly, eh? You wait months for a decent thriller and then two come along in the same week. After Danny Brocklehurst's powerful three-parter Exile on BBC1, BBC2 weighs in with the superbly cast The Shadow Line from Hugo Blick (Marion & Geoff). It's a strange, unsettling, noir-ish drama with Chiwetel Ejiofor as DI Jonah Gabriel, who returns to work after something very bad happened to him, though we don't find out what until towards the end of the episode. Gabriel's first job is to investigate the messy murder of drugs smuggler Harvey, who, along with his nephew Jay, had just been released from prison after being granted royal pardons. Rafe Spall is terrifying as the baby-faced Jay, an amoral thug who poses a serious threat to the smooth running of his uncle's "business", currently under the caretakership of Joseph (Christopher Eccleston). There are no short cuts here; it's a complicated, unsettling drama that is already laying little traps for an unsuspecting audience. A slow-burner, but worth it.
Radio Times

well it will be on iPlayer!

[Mahlerei]

Just been watching this and it's dire - a complete waste of time, IMO.

[DracoM]

Cast excellent, dialogue a catalogue of cliches, feels like Life on Mars updated. Central actors totally wasted on this.

[Frances_iom]

Cast excellent, dialogue a catalogue of cliches, feels like Life on Mars updated. Central actors totally wasted on this.

but enjoy the Manx scenery ! - much filmed on the Island

[Flosshilde]

I don't know about this 'shadow line' stuff, but I prefer French to Danish, which can be a bit sugary & sickly. Of course, in Denmark it might be rather better (but they probably don't call them 'Danish'. )

Now I must pop out & get some for my morning coffee.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

well having watched the second episode i like it .... it builds menace very effectively, great cast murky plot .... all may not be what it seems .... enigmatic even ...

[Russ]

A bit of a curate's egg for me. I was bewildered at episode one, whose lengthy opening scene, where inspector PC Plod spends ten minutes with his little torch showing us he is in fact the world's greatest ballistics expert, was so bad it was almost comedy. The rest of episode one was a typical opener where the character introductions are purposely enigmatic and saying 'look how serious we all are'. The dialogue is very up itself. Episode two was a lot better, with at least the narrative becoming more linear and understandable, but I can't help thinking there is a slightly tongue-in-cheek element to the whole thing - a nice touch was a swing at the whole cop genre, where (at last!) it was demonstrated that car chases in London are impossible because of the traffic. This ended with a sequence with the protagonists all legging it though the park at equal distances apart, with the main prey then suddenly disappearing into an obviously different location - all rather implausible. Of the villains, Rafe Spall is is too over the top psychotic for me, but I'm warming to the camped up Stephen Rea character with the slightly dodgy raincoat and the trilby (!), who you know is trying to be very serious because he does that Alec Guinness thing of putting his glasses on very slowly before he says something very serious and very slowly. I'm kinda hoping the Stephen Rea character is one of those Dennis Potter inventions where he gets to episode 5 or 6 and then realises he has no connection or relevance to the plot whatsoever.

Russ

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

yeh but it's only tosh innit?

[Russ]

yeh but it's only tosh innit?

So why did we all think The Killing wasn't tosh?

Russ

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

... a very good question Russ, it has troubled me for days ..... there was no sense of there being a game in the Killing, it was about something real, and it was made with a highly stylised, effectively so for me, realism ..... whereas Shadow Line has a touch of the Dr Who about it, a crime caper over played beyond its weight ... but who is to say where it will end up .... but it feels like Tosh, whereas the Killing felt like someone really died ....

there are many other differences in characterisation etc but that seems the important one to me ...

i suspect there is scope for a hundred doctoral theses on the effect the rejuvenation of Dr Who [and its spin-offs eg Torchwood] have had on BBC script conferences ..

[Ian Thumwood]

Calum

I think you have raised in interesting point. I gave up with "The Shadow Line" after twenty minutes as it was driving me around the bend. It was almost like a piece of Beckett the way that the two policemen inspected the car. I think that a lot of the best drama on BBC actually works on two levels -a serious one and another component where aspects seem to send it up. Dr. Who is a good example and whilst I agree that it is a load of tosh, it is still entertaining even if some episodes in the current series have been poor and hard to fathom. Last night's episode was one of the best and very much in the spirit of how I remember the programme as a child as opposed to Russell Davies' version which could drift into high camp. In it's favour, it has also ceased to have the politically correct agenda that is used to have even if the new Doctor is far less morally ambiguous. A better example would be the brilliant series "Life of mars." I don't think that the follow up "Ashes to ashes" was quite as good although the final series built up to a brilliant climax. "Life on mars" was very well acted and sophisticated in a fashion that did not compromise the entertainment. I loved the dialogue in the programme.

I missed the Danish programme but have been an avid fan of all three "Spiral" series. Curious to see that BBC 3 screened "Tell know one" last week instead which was a French film based on an American novel. Having seen this film at the pictures, I thought it had a very promising opening and looked quite stylish. The plot was also interesting enough to maintain your attention but the resolution was so far fetched as to totally lack credibility and the conclusion was dealt with all the sophistication of an edipsode of "Murder she wrote." Interestingly, this did very well in the French box office even of the beard-scratching element of the audience at Winchester were shocked to see a French film that relied so much on poor quality American mainstream cinema. This was tosh but of a very inferior quality. Staggering to see such a poor film do so well. French cinema is a real mixed bag as so much that is churned out is truly wretched and a significant proportion is merely a French version of "Shakespeare in love", "The Matrix" or "The English patient" - the borrowing from the States is far greater than the other way around despite the misconception. I find a lot of French police / crime films to be a bit over-rated. Even something like "36" is a bit uneven despite the comparisons with the American film "Heat." Those films dealing with the actual criminals themselves are better. "Mesrine" was terrific (both parts) and "The beat that my heart skipped" is probably amongst the top twenty films of the last ten years even if this was also based on an earlier American film. By and large, they are not too great. "Go fast" is probably the most interesting from the technical detail and mirrors much of the second "Spiral" series in storyline albeit the film is effectively a slick piece of propoganda for the various French anti-narcotic agencies.

If you want to watch a good bit of "French tosh" the film "Adele Blanc Sec" is pretty difficult to beat. It's a kind of Belle Epoch Lara Croft but it doesn't take itself too seriously and has some good gags in there which will appeal to most people.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

this is an interesting take on this programme ...

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

coo er last night had a twist or two ... must confess that i am enjoying this, you can adapt to the protentous pace and detachment ....

Rubicon is getting interesting, but feels like watching a tipsy tortoaise meander over the sand ...

Injustice is very ITV and watchable ...finale tonight


Case Studies i found pretty watch-able ... for a Sunday night sofa with a brain in neutral ...

all good dirty thriller watches but nowt to make one jump and shout