A sprawling, richly textured three-part crime opus, originally broadcast on British television, The “Red Riding” trilogy is now coming to an incredibly arty art-house theater somewhere near you. If you live in New York and are strong willed, the Manhattan IFC Theater is showing the whole thing in one big gulp. We suggest seeing it this way. It’s how we saw it. (We sat through the first two parts uninterrupted. When we went outside to get candy in-between the second and third parts, the shocked publicist said, “You stayed there the whole time?”). Yet don’t be afraid of any arthouse tags. This series is as thrilling, accessible and captivating as they come.
Each section of the trilogy is devoted to a different year, helmed by a different director and shot on a different film stock (16 mm, 35 mm, and using the RED digital camera that shot “Che” and “District 9”). The events in each section weave together, linked by geographical location (Yorkshire, England) and overlapping characters. The first section and first year is “In the Year of Our Lord” 1974, directed by Julian Jarrold, director of chaste British fare that middle aged white people love, like “Brideshead Revisited” and “Becoming Jane.” Here, though, he goes incredible dark to fit the film’s tenebrous tone.
As the first section of the trilogy, 1974 has a lot riding on it (pun intended). The events in this first section reverberate throughout the other films in some pretty profound ways, but on its own it’s a whip-cracking mystery. The density of its procedural elements, combined with its more plot-oriented narrative drive, is sort of like if James Ellroy wrote David Fincher’s “Zodiac” (the period setting only adds to these comparisons).
’74 stars Andrew Garfield (one of the few watchable parts of “The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus”) as an young, hungry and ambitious Yorskhire Post reporter, as he tries to crack the case of a series of missing (and presumed dead) children. Soon, one of the girls is found with a ghastly addition: a pair of angelic swan wings sewn into her back. These slayings are loosely based on the real murder spree of a killer dubbed “The Yorkshire Ripper.”
But what does this have to do with John Dawson (Sean Bean), a local bigwig who burned down a gypsy encampment to make way for his new shopping mall? And what of BJ, a male prostitute who has kept a personal file on each of the powerful men he has serviced? Things get pretty twisty and turny (frequent Terry Gilliam collaborator Tony Grisoni adapted the book series by David Peace), and we’d rather not give away more than we have to, but it’s remarkably well written and with twists that feel organic rather than placed in key spots to fool audiences.
Just go. It’s an incredibly dense, captivating and enthralling thriller. The choice of 16 mm not only gives the movie some period authenticity, but it also creates a grittier-look as well (it goes to some pretty bleak places). Jarrold really knows how to pace this thing, and creates something engrossing and entertaining on its own that’s also able to snap into the larger whole with ease and grace. Slipping into this darker material must have been fun for this director and it shows; the movie is nearly electric.
Additionally, the cast is superb. Garfield is showing himself to be one of the most talented young actors around (we can’t wait to see him in Fincher’s “Social Network” this fall) and while Sean Bean is doing his typical Sean Bean thing — menacing, vaguely paternal — it’s still superb acting and the best he’s been in years. And we haven’t even mentioned the beautiful Rebecca Hall as the mother of one of the slain girls who carries on a relationship with Garfield — and Bean.
The film’s conclusion is pretty devastating, but you (the viewer) can at least take heart in knowing that there’s four more hours of Yorkshire-set mystery and mayhem. The “Red Riding” trilogy as a whole is a huge genre accomplishment, a lushly detailed and stylized full meal, but even in bite-size form, it’s still fucking great and a must-see. [A] — Drew Taylor. Reviews of ’80 and ’83 to come.