Two notable crime dramas came to an end this week. The Tunnel and Lucan were very different, and in fact illustrate well the range of crime drama. The tenth and final episode of The Tunnel was at times slower-paced than the sometimes frenetic earlier episodes, but it continued to grip me to the end, and the decision to avoid the obvious happy ending struck me as a sound one.
The performance of Stephen Dillane, as the cop whose character flaws had, though he didn't realise it for a long time, set in motion the events that led to the exploits of the "Truth Terrorist" was superb - what a fine actor he is. The convoluted plot required suspension of disbelief on a massive scale, but the storyline did have a crazy logic, and it worked for me, despite innumerable implausibilities. Because of the wildness of the story, I didn't find The Tunnel quite as affecting as Broadchurch, which I thought the best crime drama of the year (so far) but it was still very powerful..
I wasn't sure whether the decision to spin out Lucan to three hours was a good one, but it's a tribute to both Jeff Pope, the scriptwriter, and the excellent cast that it worked, and I didn't lose interest during the second and concluding part of the story. Who knows what Lord Lucan's precise fate was - in this version, he was thrown off a ship when his continued existence became an embarrassment to his posh friends. It can safely be said that he was no great loss, but above all I felt sorry for the parents of the luckless nanny who was killed simply because she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. As they said in the screenplay, despite all the fuss about Lucan and his circle, it is wrong for her to be forgotten.
Showing posts with label Lucan. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Lucan. Show all posts
Sunday, 22 December 2013
Monday, 16 December 2013
Lucan - ITV review
Lucan is a two-part ITV programme about one of the most renowned murder cases of the Seventies and I've just caught up with the first part. Nobody has ever been put on trial for the murder of the Lucan family nanny, Sandra Rivett, but Lord Lucan's disappearance meant that he has always been prime suspect. And the makers of this programme made it clear that they considered him guilty. Unjust? Well, Lucan was, by all accounts, a vile man. The great mystery is what happened to him after the killing.
This version of the story is based on a book by John Pearson, and follows his attempts to find out about the closed circle of rich men who were members of Lucan's clique at the Clermont Club, where he gambled away the family fortune. Pearson is played by the always impressive Paul Freeman. Lucan, as played by Rory Kinnear, is not just posh and rich, but vicious and very, very stupid. The other main villain of the story is the weird John Aspinall, played with his customary excellence by Christopher Ecclestone, who exploits Lucan, and eggs him on to dark deeds. He also appears to be an advocate of eugenics.
The rich are different, we are often told. Not in a good way, though, if Lucan is any guide. The murder of Sandra Rivett, a poor woman who was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, was a repellent crime committed by a repellent person. In fact, the main weakness of this well made and well cast programme was that it took ninety minutes to tell a depressingly straightforward story. I shall watch the second part, in the hope of a credible explanation for Lucan's fate. Is he still alive? I can't imagine it. You'd surely have to be much more intelligent than Lucan to evade attention for forty years.
One of the reasons why stories like the Lucan case appeal so widely, of course, is that most people have an instinctive desire to believe that wealth does not equate to happiness. Lucan certainly supports this view, but there is a legitimate question as to whether it is right to dramatise the case when some of the innocent people involved are still alive. It must be painful for Lady Lucan and her children, and the story makes it clear that she and they deserve sympathy. But after forty years, surely it's fair enough to make a programme about the case, provided every attempt is made to stick to the facts.
This version of the story is based on a book by John Pearson, and follows his attempts to find out about the closed circle of rich men who were members of Lucan's clique at the Clermont Club, where he gambled away the family fortune. Pearson is played by the always impressive Paul Freeman. Lucan, as played by Rory Kinnear, is not just posh and rich, but vicious and very, very stupid. The other main villain of the story is the weird John Aspinall, played with his customary excellence by Christopher Ecclestone, who exploits Lucan, and eggs him on to dark deeds. He also appears to be an advocate of eugenics.
The rich are different, we are often told. Not in a good way, though, if Lucan is any guide. The murder of Sandra Rivett, a poor woman who was just in the wrong place at the wrong time, was a repellent crime committed by a repellent person. In fact, the main weakness of this well made and well cast programme was that it took ninety minutes to tell a depressingly straightforward story. I shall watch the second part, in the hope of a credible explanation for Lucan's fate. Is he still alive? I can't imagine it. You'd surely have to be much more intelligent than Lucan to evade attention for forty years.
One of the reasons why stories like the Lucan case appeal so widely, of course, is that most people have an instinctive desire to believe that wealth does not equate to happiness. Lucan certainly supports this view, but there is a legitimate question as to whether it is right to dramatise the case when some of the innocent people involved are still alive. It must be painful for Lady Lucan and her children, and the story makes it clear that she and they deserve sympathy. But after forty years, surely it's fair enough to make a programme about the case, provided every attempt is made to stick to the facts.
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