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Friday, March 06, 2009, 09:30
Jeremy Clay
Red Riding (9pm, Channel 4) started with a gathering storm; a rumble of thunder from the dark heart of an ominous sky.
After lingering awhile on the churning black clouds, the camera drifted down, to a girl lying dead in a puddle.
A bleak beginning, then. And one that set the tone for the cheerless two hours which followed.
It’s never been quite so grim up North as it was here, in this intense tale of corruption and murder played out in a desolate 1970s Yorkshire, where violence and greed simmered just under the surface like the electrical charge crackling through that storm.
%3Cbody%3E%3Cdiv%20id%3D%22adDiv%22%3E%3CA%20HREF%3D%22http%3A//ads.anm.co.uk/ADCLICK/CID%3Dfffffffcfffffffcfffffffc/AAMSZ%3D452x118/POS%3D/SITE%3DTHISISLEIC/AREA%3DENTERTAINMENT/SUBAREA%3DHEADLINES/ARTICLE%3D749186/acc_random%3D1371618493/pageid%3D/RS%3D%22%20target%3D%22_new%22%3E%3CIMG%20SRC%3D%22http%3A//iad.anm.co.uk/anmdefaultad.gif%22%20ALT%3D%22%22%20border%3D0%20style%3D%22margin-bottom%3A%200px%3B%22%3E%3C/A%3E%3C/div%3EThe result was unsettling, unnerving and occasionally unpleasant. It was also unmissable: bold, brutal and brilliant TV.
Andrew Garfield starred as Eddie Dunford, a cocksure new crime reporter on the Yorkshire Post who’s drawn into the shadows of murky local life.
His fellow hacks are drunk, bent or washed up. Sometimes all three. The cops are rotten to the core. Everyone smokes like they’re in training for a Mad Men audition. And everyone’s in the pocket of poisonous property magnate John Dawson, who drips with menace thanks to an eye-opening turn by Sean Bean.
Eddie, who never seems to open his notebook let alone file a story, falls in with the damaged mum of another missing girl, an outstanding portrayal of fragile, brittle, bewildered grief by Rebecca Hall.
And soon enough, the trail leads to Dawson.
At its most basic level, this is a fairly conventional crime thriller: good guy on the trail of some bad ones, goes bad himself. Think LA Confidential, transposed to Leeds.
And the most basic level is where you’ll find Red Riding’s only real flaw.
After being roughed up, duffed up and finally tortured by West Yorkshire police - in scenes of quite shocking ferocity - Eddie’s ethics are as bruised and broken as his body.
So Eddie shoots Dawson. But not before the moneyman admits to the murders.
There’s no explanation why he did them. Or how. Nor how Eddie found out.
In most shows that would be a glaring weakness. But somehow Red Riding survived it.
Maybe that’s because the loose ends will be tied up in the next two episodes of the trilogy.
Maybe it’s because life itself is full of loose ends.
But most likely of all, it’s because the tremendous direction and exceptional ensemble cast excused the imperfections.
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