Shane Meadows is a particular blind spot in my cinematic life. I've not seen any of his films, even the ones regularly touted as modern British classics. It's not deliberate, its just never worked out for me yet, but when this three-part adaptation of the Benjamin Myers novel released on the BBC, I decided to give it a try. I'm glad I did.
David Hartley (Michael Socha) staggers back to his family home in Yorkshire, bleeding heavily from a stab wound, having been working in Birmingham for the past few years. In his delirious state, a man with a stag's skull on his head tells him that he must repent his former selfish ways and use his criminal skill for the good of his village. The village is suffering as the industrial revolution has taken the weaving jobs towards big cities, but David proposes that they use his skills as a coin cutter to produce counterfeit currency.
I'll be the first to admit that I wasn't sure what I was watching for the first half of the first episode. There nearest touchstone I had for the incongruous psychedelic music against the period visuals was Sky's "Britannia" series. But once Hartley starts to recover from his ordeal, and explain his plan then, by the end of that episode I was on board. There's a naturalistic semi-improvised nature to the dialogue which once you're dialled into really works - and allows for the cast to be funny. Particularly the central pairing of Socha and Sophie McShera, who plays David's girlfriend that he abandoned to head to Birmingham. The comedy MVP though is probably Adam Fogerty, who plays family friend Broadbent, who really comes into his own in the second and third episodes.
I understand that this effectively operates as a prequel for the actual novel, and if he decided to, Meadows could revisit this world to see the marked effect that Hartley's enterprise has on the UK economy, but for now it's a funny and surprisingly warm story that could just do with being a little more accessible in it's early scenes.
David Hartley (Michael Socha) staggers back to his family home in Yorkshire, bleeding heavily from a stab wound, having been working in Birmingham for the past few years. In his delirious state, a man with a stag's skull on his head tells him that he must repent his former selfish ways and use his criminal skill for the good of his village. The village is suffering as the industrial revolution has taken the weaving jobs towards big cities, but David proposes that they use his skills as a coin cutter to produce counterfeit currency.
I'll be the first to admit that I wasn't sure what I was watching for the first half of the first episode. There nearest touchstone I had for the incongruous psychedelic music against the period visuals was Sky's "Britannia" series. But once Hartley starts to recover from his ordeal, and explain his plan then, by the end of that episode I was on board. There's a naturalistic semi-improvised nature to the dialogue which once you're dialled into really works - and allows for the cast to be funny. Particularly the central pairing of Socha and Sophie McShera, who plays David's girlfriend that he abandoned to head to Birmingham. The comedy MVP though is probably Adam Fogerty, who plays family friend Broadbent, who really comes into his own in the second and third episodes.
I understand that this effectively operates as a prequel for the actual novel, and if he decided to, Meadows could revisit this world to see the marked effect that Hartley's enterprise has on the UK economy, but for now it's a funny and surprisingly warm story that could just do with being a little more accessible in it's early scenes.