The first half of 2009 contains a couple of things in film and television which are of considerable interest to me - both of them David Peace - related. I already knew that a film adaptation of The Damned United with Michael Sheen as Brian Clough was going to be out. Now a preview of the year in one of the papers has informed me that Channel 4 will be screening an adaption of the same author's Red Riding Quartet starting in March.
This has considerable potential. For some time I've felt that British T.V. drama has been severely outclassed by that of American T.V., and by the output of H.B.O. in particular - the fact that I'm currently five episodes into the first series of The Wire is only confirming my opinion. Handled right, the Red Riding novels are the kind of source material which could produce something good. There are, of course, the normal concerns about the lower budgets of British T.V. and the possibility of a certain level of sanitisation taking place - things which made the recent adaptations of Jake Arnott's The Long Firm and He Kills Coppers somewhat lacklusture. Either way, I await the broadcasts with interest.
2 comments:
Well, I hope this lives up to the books (though I've only read the one so far). I looked at the trailer on C4's website, and can't really tell much from it. It looks worryingly Life-on-Mars-like in some ways, and apparently the corruption "goes all the way to the top". Sigh.
On the other hand, it is only the trailer. Have you seen the trailer for In Bruges? Shocking. No wonder no one went to see it.
Glad to hear Dad relinquished The Wire! Even the audio commentaries are worth listening to...
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