The Shadow Line

Literature & Writing Reviews & Recommendations
1

Has anybody been watching this drama series, which finished its run on BBC2 yesterday evening? Different, so complicated that it sparked a weekly blog in The Guardian newspaper to explain it, and – in my view – flawed but wonderful (although I can see why some regarded it as overblown and indulgent). Written, directed and produced by a single individual, Hugo Blick, I hope the BBC does more like it. To me it had lots of lessons to teach, good and bad, on plotting, characterisation and dialogue.

If you haven’t seen it, worth catching if it comes your way.

2

Yeah, I got hooked on it. Crap ending!

To be honest, since watching it, every time my work’s pension goes into the bank, I can’t help feeling MF’s pension fund could have done with a, Stephen Rea, ‘Gatehouse’. :confused: :frowning:
vic

3

Yes, I think the series lost it the moment the word “pensions” was uttered. But Gatehouse was a wonderful creation — son of George Smiley and Satan’s sister.

4

Some brilliant character portrayals though.
Rafe Spall’s Jay Wratten & Freddie Fox’s Ratallack :open_mouth: :smiling_imp:

5

Absolutely agree. I’d add Christopher Eccleston’s Bede to that list. And the corrupt policeman - can’t remember his name - who appeared in the very first scene was also pretty good. To me, one of the clever things about the series was that despite the complexity of the plot and the stylised and unnatural slant of the dialogue and the camera-work (tomato soup, anyone?), it remained gripping, and the brilliant character portrayals were a big part of that.

6

Sheesh, why doesn’t BBC web stream to the world?
Over here, I’m stuck with reruns of Bramwell on Netflix Instant.
Oh, and A Touch of Frost. First Inspector show that ever put me to zzzzzzzzz
Not counting Daziel & Pascoe.
Back to Bramwell. Give me a Redgrave girl and a nice, oozy bit of liver… :mrgreen:

7

Ah, Bramwell — that takes me back. I had a nano-scule involvement. Yes, Jemma Redgrave did a good job.

The Shadow Line is consciously in the tradition of State of Play (the better TV drama series, not the disappointing movie) and Edge of Darkness. But most unusually for any TV drama series from any broadcaster, it was written, produced and directed by one person (Hugo Blick, whose record till now has been in comedy. Perhaps for that reason, he really understands about dialogue that isn’t “on the nose”). He assembled an unusually starry cast of British thesps, who, as Vic indicates, were generally excellent. I hope it crosses the Atlantic.

BTW, complexity-wise, Curio plus Scrivener would have been ideal for drafting it.

8

Edge of Darkness and State of Play put most of the others to shame.Theme tune to EofD haunted me for yonks!
youtube.com/watch?v=2bfPS7p6 … re=related
Actually, listening to that music brought a lot of it back to me. I’ve just gone and bought the EofD DVD. Aren’t I impulsive? :blush: :smiling_imp:
Vic

9

No, worthwhile buy I’m sure, if only to see whether it’s as good as memory makes it. I‘m willing to bet it will seem a lot slower than most modern conspiracy thrillers, though nothing wrong with that. I remember/misremember a terrific shot of black flowers shivering on a hillside with that music rising behind. And Bob Peck — nice man, excellent casting.

The Shadow Line might have benefitted from an injection of “Slowhand”.

10

NFlix has Edge of Darkness, so I signed up for it.
Thanks for the tip!
While waiting, I’ll go for The Singing Detective Again.

11

youtube.com/watch?v=wEzB-x_URfc :confused:

12

I’m going to have to disagree with folk here in quite a VEHEMENT manner. It was beautifully shot, but I thought the plot was total bobbins. Some of acting was technically excellent - Stephen Rea in particular was superb (despite being shot, blown up and attacked and still carrying on regardless like he was, well, drinking tea) - but some of the plot twists and ‘issues with reality’ made Luther look like a documentary.
Time and time again we ended up with two issues:

  1. Two talking heads gurning at each other, managing not to descend to ‘Lock Stock’ talk, but not far off.
  2. Entire scenes constructed which hinged entirely upon unreasonable, unbelievable mountains of things. The kid being shot for instance (how does he get out of the cot, why are there three exits from the lounge, why doesn’t he say anything, where’s he running to? how does Rea survive? why is the cop collaborating with the lawyer when he knows he’s going to kill him? why does his ex return? The gangsters - risible. The supporting cops - risible. The main cop has a WALK IN CLOSET for god’s sake BUT the Asst Chief Constable or whatever he was has a corner office the size of a broom cupboard? In fact, all the offices were wrong. The cars are all wrong. The clothes are all wrong.

Just because something’s got Chris Ecclestone in it doing his honourable Northerner schtick doesn’t mean it’s any good.

It was nowhere - NOWHERE - near as good as anything else that’s been mentioned on this thread. Yes, it shines beacon-like from the schedules because of the unrelenting shower of toss that the main UK networks now output, but I think this was the wrong project for the auteur approach - he needed a producer or to separate the writer/director roles.

fx:and breathe. I don’t know why I get so hung up on believability nowadays. It’s mainly since more people started reading my stuff and pointing out realism errors in it. Ranting doesn’t compensate in any way, shape or form, but it is marginally more productive than sticking my head in a bucket of Verdejo.

13

Blimey! The memory wasn’t wrong! And guitar work for which the word “plangent” was invented.

@monk, I don’t think I’d disagree with much of what you say. But it was a conscious attempt to be different in all sorts of ways from much of the drama fare on U.K. TV at the moment, and for that I think it should be praised.

14

Ivan, viejo amigo,
maybe, we’re going through a phase of, ‘Let’s suspend disbelief for a year or two’, pushing at the boundaries a bit, creating a, surreal realism, genre. Once away from boring, realism realism, writers will have recaptured the art of subtly embellishing the real, just enough to make it fascinating. Fascinating enough not to send druid to sleep. Just a thought. :confused:
Take care
Vic

15

Iván,
¿qué pasó con Universo de Tom? :confused:
Fluff

16

How true Hugh…how true. :slight_smile:

17

@vic-k Perhaps. In times of austerity we’re meant to retreat to fantasy and escapism, which helps to explain Mad Men, Downton Abbey, Game of Thrones, Dr Who and Luther/Sherlock. It doesn’t, however, explain Forbryldesen. Or how one of the most boring (but ‘realistic’) crime writers (that Stieg Girl snoozefest) in recent times has just become the sixth book to sell over 2M copies in the UK.

@fluff - cruelly (one must always use this word, non?) rejected by agents, because in retrospect it wasn’t very good. But in the review process I had to deal with endless complaints about accuracy - both factual and ‘experienced’. About Jewishness, autism, Brighton seafront, coffee machines, funeral arrangements, mathematics. My main character drank too much, cried too much, the female reviewers scoffed at his ability to maintain a relationship. I was corrected (by people who weren’t there) on several things which had happened to me which I was putting down verbatim.

Although as it turns out, one man’s verbatim is quite different from an ex’s verbatim. How fickle memory - or reality - can be…

Onwards, as they say. Actually, I think this realism thing is a reaction to all the SF I read growing up, and how I find it increasingly difficult to ‘think in SF’ terms. The world isn’t magical, and full of possibilities. It’s just there. On a good day, it mocks me. But mostly, it ignores me. As it should.

18

Ivan, I’m at a disadvantage because I’ve not yet seen TSL, but I agree with Vic :open_mouth: that we don’t always need strict realism, even in a crime/cops story. I’m watching the Edge of Darkness now (turned out we owned a copy) and I think it’s cool that Craven sees & talks with his daughter after she’s dead. Not realistic, but then people do speak to the dead as part of a grieving process, trying to keep them alive in memory. People have many irrational, illogical moments, and portraying that is a valid form of psychological realism, I think.

On the other hand, your experience with manuscript reviewers is all too familiar: readers who can’t have relationships say that your characters can’t, either. Trying to find someone intelligent and widely, deeply read in an agency or a publishing house is a nightmare. My advice: turn them all into enemies and villains in your next book. Skewer them and have a secret chuckle when they write a rave acceptance.

19

@vic-k Perhaps. In times of austerity we’re meant to retreat to fantasy and escapism, which helps to explain Mad Men, Downton Abbey, Game of Thrones, Dr Who and Luther/Sherlock. It doesn’t, however, explain Forbryldesen. A shot of Sarah Lund, early on in the series, in woolly pully and knickers, kept most blokes going back for more. You’ll have to accept…it’s the lure of the , ‘Who Done It’, with more red herrings than a ‘Rollmop bottling plant’. Or how one of the most boring (but ‘realistic’) crime writers (that Stieg Girl snoozefest) in recent times has just become the sixth book to sell over 2M copies in the UK. If you asked the two million readers what they thought about the trilogy. The sales could have more to do with expectation rather than the realisation of those same expectations. But! But! But! Why no mention of, the French, Spiral? , now that was/is good! :smiling_imp:

@fluff - cruelly (one must always use this word, non? [oui!]) rejected by agents, because in retrospect it wasn’t very good. But in the review process I had to deal with endless complaints about accuracy - both factual and ‘experienced’. About Jewishness, autism, Brighton seafront, coffee machines, funeral arrangements, mathematics. My main character drank too much, cried too much, the female reviewers scoffed at his ability to maintain a relationship. I was corrected (by people who weren’t there) on several things which had happened to me which I was putting down verbatim.

Although as it turns out, one man’s verbatim is quite different from an ex’s verbatim. How fickle memory - or reality - can be…at least you learnt something from the experience then.

Onwards, as they say. Actually, I think this realism thing is a reaction to all the SF I read growing up, and how I find it increasingly difficult to ‘think in SF’ terms. The world isn’t magical, and full of possibilities. It’s just there. On a good day, it mocks me. But mostly, it ignores me. As it should.
Ivan[i] A lack of realism, be it a realistic vampire, or a private secretary or rather a credibility gap surrounding those characters, is a deadener…unless there is something there to compensate. They have to engage your sense of…the absurd, I think. It’s what they achieved with the characters that mattered in ‘Shadowline’.
Fluff

[/i].