Tag: Police

“Chantal” – TV Series Review

A scene from the Dutch TV series “Chantal.” Courtesy of MHz Choice

We’ll start the review of “Chantal: Season One” with a “consumer caution:” if you’re looking for an extension of the 2007 soft-core porn flick with the same title, this ain’t nowhere close to the same ballpark, so cool the jets of your libido before starting.

Regular readers know I’ve reviewed a lot of European crime series here, including many that were comedic in tone. This dramedy offers a couple of unique aspects: it’s our first from Belgium, and it’s more droll than other light faves like “Capitaine Marleau” or “Captain Sharif”. The familiar part is that the eponymous police detective (Maaike Cafmeyer) comes to a small town to head its unit. She moves there with her daughter (Anna-Marie Missoul) seeking a less taxing turf than before, so she’ll have more time to study for the Commander exam. This is meant to be only a short-term gig before moving to Brussels for the higher-level training if she passes, and a meatier position thereafter.

The little town of Loveringem, located in the western part of Flanders, isn’t quite ready for a female cop. Even though Chantal is middle-aged, everyone she meets assumes this newcomer must be an underling. She’s also resented by Rik “the Sheriff” Cloedt (Dries Heyneman) who assumed he’d become top banana, only to be outranked by the first distaff colleague they’d seen. Besides the sexism, Chantal has to circumvent smug cops from higher-ranking agencies who diss her little band of locals and try to shunt them off to menial tasks… or less.

Part of the droll humor comes from the prevailing cowboy motif of the community, despite its apparent dearth of cattle. Most of the guys dress like extras in an oater. They typically drink beer from the bottle, rather than wine. The homey main bar/social hub (Café Misery) looks like a roadhouse teleported from the southern US, complete with country music and line dancing. Everything but a mechanical bull in the décor.

Season One consists of eight hour-long episodes, opening and closing with two-parters, surrounding six stand-alone murders to solve. As usual for Euro-fare, there’s not much action or visible gore throughout. The scripts are written well enough so that even the more obvious mysteries are entertaining to watch. The cast is completely non-glamorous, making all the characters as relatable as they come, with a mix of bad eggs, good folk and oddballs. A bunch of players get fleshed out with story arcs, making the series grow cozier for viewers as they continue.

No cliffhangers. Season Two has already aired abroad, and most who start here should be eager for Chantal’s further adventures to join this charming intro to our side of the Atlantic.

“Chantel” Season One, mostly in Dutch with English subtitles, begins streaming on MHz Choice starting Tuesday, Feb. 25.

RATING: 3 out of 4 stars

“Cassandre” Season 1 – TV Series Review

Gwendoline Hamon as Cassandre, in the French TV crime drama “Cassandre” Season One. Courtesy of MHz Choice

The premise of the French TV crime drama, “Cassandre,” is nothing new to fans of the genre. A police detective from Paris moves to a much smaller city due to some sort of scandal/personal problem that made him/her want/need a change of scenery badly enough to take a big step down the career ladder. But based on the two episodes comprising first half of its debut season that were available for review, the scripts and casting still make this one a fine entry into your realm of viewing options. I must not be the only one thinking that way. After starting in 2015, it’s now up to 30 episodes (and still counting), with the same principal cast.

Gwendoline Hamon stars in the title role as an ambitious, successful detective who asks for transfer to the city where, as we soon learn, the juvenile detention school her surly teenage son Jules (Luca Malinowski) was sentenced to is located. She’s resented by her new colleagues not only for being an outsider, but for replacing the beloved old boss, who just happened to be the husband of the prosecutor (Beatrice Agenin) and the father of #2 detective Pascal (Alexandre Varga), who everyone assumed would take up his father’s position. For another source of friction within the unit, Nicky (Jessy Salomee Ugolin) is secretly boinking Pascal and worries that this rather attractive new arrival will provide competition for his affections.

The first case offers no respite, as the body of a hang glider soon shows itself to be the result of murder, not mishap. She was the wife of a man who is part of a rich and influential family. They resist any investigation that could reflect poorly on them or their businesses. Even worse, Cassandre’s inquiries turn up some old skeletons that are even more upsetting to many of the principals.

The second case is about the murder of a popular teacher at Jules’ school. Once again, the pressure is on because many locals were already fearful of the bad kids being housed in their town, and would love finding a scandal to justify closing it. If you don’t know what NIMBY means, Google it, since it’s an attitude that exists just about everywhere.

The cast is excellent. As usual for Euro fare, they are mostly attractive, but well shy of glamorous, to keep them in a relatively relatable dimension. There’s also less action and bloodshed than one typically finds in comparable US crime dramas. One bonus is the fourth member of the squad, Dominique Pinon, whose distinctive face you will recognize even if you don’t know his name. The veteran actor has played a wide array of supporting characters in comedies and dramas on both sides of the Atlantic, and always delivers the goods. With about 200 movie and TV credits under his belt, it’s gratifying to see him landing a steady gig.

There’s a lot of melodrama in the mix, especially surrounding Cassandre, her bitter son and bitterer (I don’t care if that’s not a real word. I like the way it scans here) ex. That’s usually a turn-off for me, but it’s all so well written and integrated by series creators Bruno Lecigne and Matthieu Masmondet that they set the table for a long and satisfying run.

“Cassandre” Season One, in French with English subtitles, streams on MHz Choice starting Tuesday, Jan. 14.

RATING: 3.5 out of 4 stars

Jessy Ugolin, Dominique Pinon, Gwendoline Hamon, Alexandre Varga

CUSTOMS FRONTLINE – Review

A scene from Hong Kong action crime film CUSTOMS FRONTLINE. Courtesy of Well Go USA Entertainment

In CUSTOMS FRONTLINE, Hong Kong delivers plenty of high-octane, large-scale action in this subtitled contemporary cop adventure. The protagonists are the city’s harbor patrol, charged with stopping maritime smuggling. They learn a major international arms dealer that no one in law enforcement has ever seen may be routing heavy-duty weaponry through their waters. The case begins with their boarding an inbound ship with all its crew having been murdered. The retirement benefits for employees in that “industry” seem severely lacking. No union? No perks.

The harbor police teams with reps from Interpol in the pursuit. Our heroes are two guys leading the way. Cheung (Jacky Cheung) is the grizzled veteran. Lai (Nicholas Tse) is his adoring disciple. The story is complex, with scenes occurring in multiple countries, on land and sea, keeping lots of balls in the air, including who is trustworthy among the authorities. We know who the big bad boss is long before the cops do and witness the level of cold cruelty on that side of the crime coin. Many times.

Although Erica Li’s script is above average for the genre with a few surprises along the way, the real stars are director Herman Yau and the horde of stunt and F/X specialists who crafted the sets and choreographed the mayhem. Several sequences are epic in proportion, with a stunning array of shootouts, explosions and crashes while running up an impressive body count. Hong Kong’s sleek, modern architecture and picturesque harbor contrast nicely with the sordid events occurring therein.

Character development is better than most but the action provides more than sufficient reason to watch, and preferably on the largest available screen.

CUSTOMS FRONTLINE, in Mandarin and Cantonese Chinese with English subtitles, opens in theaters on Friday, July 19.

RATING: 2.5 out of 4 stars

“Fosca” Season 2 TV Series Review

A scene from the Italian TV series “Fosca.” Courtesy of MHzChoice

In the first season of “Fosca Innocenti” we followed the light mystery adventures of the eponymous Deputy Police Chief (Vanessa Incontrada) and her mostly-female team of detectives in the picturesque Tuscany city of Arezzo (where the series is filmed). Each of the four 100-minute episodes presented a different case, with ongoing subplots for the principals. Some were romantic. The major one was Fosca’s barely-repressed desire to transcend her lifelong Friend Zone status with Cosimo (Francesco Arca). But the charming café owner was planning to emigrate to the U.S. for a major career advancement, further reducing her odds of securing that upgrade. The scripts were appropriately suspenseful while developing a likable set of protagonists and making fine use of the beauty of the setting. For a unique element, Fosca’s acute, almost canine, sense of smell helps solve the crime in many of the episodes.

At the end of Season One, it looked like Fosca and Cosimo just might become a couple. Season Two picks up from there, with the two seeming blissfully happy, nestled into the magnificent estate she’d inherited from her adored father. But how dull would that idyllic state be for another quartet of adventures? Impermissibly is the answer. That’s when Lapo (Giovanni Scifoni), Fosca’s beau from 20 years earlier, shows up with a deed indicating that her dad had signed the property over his dad! Lapo’s coming home after a long absence to claim the mansion, grounds and contents, forcing her out so he can list it for sale. It soon becomes apparent that his underlying agenda is winning her back with a combination of this leverage and triggered nostalgia.

But wait! There’s more! Rosa (Cecilia Dazzi), the married member of the team, discovers that her long-term hubby is cheating on her. Lesbian Giulia (Desiree Noferini) runs through a handful of affairs, of which one is particularly frustrating. Pino (Francesco Leone), the only guy in the crew, finds himself torn between his fiancée who has moved to Sicily, imposing a difficult long-distance romance, and Rita (Caterina Signorini), the cute new member of the staff, who also seems drawn to him.

As for the crimes, the first involves a bride fallen or pushed from a window hours before tying the knot with the owner of a large vineyard. The second centers on a seamstress murdered in a dress shop, exposing a mare’s nest of secrets from her past, greatly expanding the suspect pool. The third gives us the attempted murder of Fosca’s neighbor and close friend, from which a successful offing ensues. The fourth puts us in the middle of crimes among those in the perfume industry occurring during a major trade show.

For Season Two, the producers switched to a different writer and director from those who crafted the first. It shows. This round shifts the running time balance considerably more to the personal stories than the subject crimes they’re solving. Depending on your preferences, that could be a plus by getting deeper insights about, and empathy with, the set of protagonists; or you might think their cluster of romantic story arcs veers too heavily into soap opera territory. There’s little nudity or on-screen violence, making the melodrama more prominent.

The season ends with reasonable closure for all the plot threads, making the package satisfying as an intact miniseries, if it’s over. Since it aired only last year, it’s still early enough for the cast to be around for a Season Three. I’d welcome it – especially if they return to more time for the crime.

“Fosca: Season 2,” in Italian with English subtitles, is available streaming starting Tuesday, June 18, on MHzChoice.

RATING: 2 out of 4 stars

BAD BOYS: RIDE OR DIE – Review

Buckle up because the Summer movie season kicks into high gear with a brand-new installment of a big loud action franchise. This one goes back 29 years, so it’s a few decades behind the recent FURIOSA which is the latest entry of a series that’s now 45 years old. Oddly this weekend’s big release marks only four years since the previous, the shortest turn-around time of the four. Yes, this makes for a quartet centered around a buddy-cop duo that’s well into middle age but still embraces a youthful moniker in BAD BOYS: RIDE OR DIE.

As this adventure begins, detectives Mike Lowery (Will Smith) and Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) are racking up the moving violations as they speed through the sun-baked streets of Miami. But they’re not in pursuit of a “perp”. No, it’s Mike’s wedding day, to his beautiful physical therapist Christine (Melanie Liburd). Naturally Marcus parties way too hard and is felled by a massive heart attack, much to the shock of co-workers Kelly (Vanessa Hudges), Dorn (Alexander Ludwig), and Captain Rita (Paola Nunez) who’s with her new beau, Mayor (and maybe future governor) Lockwood (Ioan Gruffudd). But while Marcus recoups in the hospital, the evil plans of the mysterious McGrath (Eric Dane) are set into motion when he has a hacker wire millions of dollars of drug money into the account of the former police captain (RIP) Howard (Joe Pantoliano). As Mike visits Marcus, he awakens after a vision (involving that same late boss) and announces that he is now “invincible”. This is set aside when they’re called in about the new “evidence” that Howard was “on the take”. Mike is determined to clear him. But how do they get info on the possible “framers’ in the powerful drug cartel? His best link may be his incarcerated illegitimate hitman son Armando (Jacob Scipio), who was revealed in the previous film. When they try and bring him in for questioning, McGrath sabotages the air transport, sending the trio on the “lam”, after being “set up” for the murders of the pilot and security. Now the trio is wanted, not only by the feds, including Howard’s daughter turned FBI agent Judy (Rhea Seehorn) who wants revenge against Armando, but also by the underworld when McGrath puts out a multi-million dollar dead-or-alive bounty on them. Can the trio survive despite Mike’s crippling anxiety attacks, take down McGrath, and clear their names?

The series duo appear to be “punching the clock” as they try to inject some new life into this now multi-generational action storyline. Smith seems to be going through the ‘tough cop” checklist which may account for the addition of the “panic attack” dent in his armor (the Kryptonite for this super-cop). Perhaps this was thought to give Mike an “edge’, while Smith tries to recapture that “Big-Willie magic” and make audiences forget that Oscar “incident” (now the former “July 4th King” has to get a month’s head start at the box office). For much of the time he’s the irritated ‘straight man’ for the ham-fisted histrionics of Lawrence, now a bug-eyed caricature shouting out every line as though the volume makes up for the lack of real wit. The rest of the cast mainly blends into the background with Hudgens and Ludwig doing a riff on the “guy in the chair” clicking away on the keyboard as Nunez tries to keep the title twosome on track. Dane as McGrath is a cliched one-note thriller sadist, but at least one other male twosome gets a chance to shine. Scipio seethes with resentment and a bit of familial yearning before he flexes his fight skills in a terrific prison yard smackdown. Ditto for Dennis Green as the “straight from the front lines” Reggie, the son-in-law of Marcus, who becomes a fearsome protector when the baddies breach “casa de Burnett”. There are a couple of “fan service ” cameos from actors seen in earlier installments along with a needlessly explicit bit of nastiness from Tiffany Haddish, there just to shock us and earn the “R” rating.

The mayhem is overseen by another duo, Aldi El Arbi and Bilall Fallah who helmed the last entry, FOR LIFE, four years ago. They attempt to “ratchet up” the frequent stunt scenes while trying to engage us in the bond between the two leads ( who sometime behave as though they’re in different flicks). It all gets a bit exhausting as the story lumbers through so many late-last-century action blockbuster cliches and set pieces. I mean the establishing shots of a fun and sexy city in the sun feel lifted right out of a classic first season “Miami Vice” from the 80s (not to mention the intrusive “product “placements”). Plus the guys telegraph the big plot “twists” (the guns are taken so they can be used in the frame moments later) included the big climax in an ole shuttered alligator theme park (could we get a CGI attack ala’ ERASER, mmm). And boy, are A and F thrilled with “drone tech”? The camera careens over the chaos in some many dizzying bits, you may regret having those concession stand nachos. It leads up to an extended piece in the middle of the big rescue that feels like a “first person” shooter video game as we bounce from Mike’s POV to the almost endless “goon fodder”. And of course, there’s the mind-numbing property damage as they create auto wreckage for several new huuge junkyards. Plus the big reveal of the opening moments with Mike tying the not is quickly jettisoned. His bride Christine exists, like many characters, to be an eventual pawn in McGrath’s plan (not even a bit with the newlyweds setting up a shared home). ah, but there’s ample time for a cringy revamp of the big theme song (we needed this “pep rap”). Of course, this doesn’t matter to fans of the franchise as they see these two taking on the baddies (an encounter with backwoods rednecks goes nowhere) and making things “blow up real good”. For casual viewers who can make it past all the winking bits of “fan service”, you may wish that they will finally hang up the holsters and turn in their badges after BAD BOYS: RIDE OR DIE.

1.5 Out of 4

BAD BOYS: RIDE OR DIE opens in theatres everywhere on Friday, June 7, 2024

“The Art of Crime” Season 6 – TV series review

Florence (Eleonore Bernheim) and Antoine (Nicolas Gob), in the French TV crime series “Art of Crime.” Courtesy of MHz Choice

This light crime series from France, “The Art of Crime,” provides the usual elements of TV mysteries with a painless education in the meanings of classic paintings and personalized art history. Don’t yawn yet. Keep reading a bit further.

The Paris police have a special unit for art-related crimes. Antoine (Nicolas Gob) is assigned to it as a banishment from the serious crime squad he’d thrived on until he pissed off the wrong honcho. His complete lack of knowledge about or interest in this milieu makes the transfer even more punitive. He’s also forced to accept a partnership with a quirky consultant, Florence (Eleonore Bernheim), whose expertise in the Old Masters is essential to catching the offenders. Each case is handled in two 50-minute episodes, so no pressure to binge.

The novelty is that Florence hallucinates conversations with the subject artist of each case in reaching her “aha!” moments of insight into the who and why of all the thefts, forgeries, murders, etc. they handle. Whenever I Googled the artist or painting du jour, the scripts seemed to be on the nose, providing an entertaining and painless path to learning something new. Those already educated in this area may differ on the facts, interpretations and speculations in the scripts, so don’t take my words or theirs as gospel.

As must be the case for all oil-and-water pairings in such fare, the two clash constantly. Antoine seems incapable of absorbing and retaining whatever he needs to learn about the art. He also runs on a default angry setting, due to resentment about how he got there, and some serious daddy issues. Florence is excited about this new use for her knowledge but has a whole different set of issues with her dad, Pierre (Philippe Duclose), who keeps inserting himself into her personal and professional existence, whether wanted or not; usually, the latter. Pierre’s annoying actions in trying to prove himself indispensable make him an unusual asset to the production.

The tension between the two principals leads to an all but inevitable will-they-won’t-they bit of comic relief that runs throughout. Season Six is a pair of two-part episodes, in which the personal dynamic between Antoine and Florence takes some odd turns straddling the fence separating warm humor from silliness. It may be the funniest of the series, while still offering a couple of sufficiently twisty crimes for the suspense factor. The first begins with a dead nude model that requires a deep dive into Monet.

Production values are first-rate, making excellent use of the Louvre and many other Paris landmarks and attractions in each of its stories. The scripts also maintain a nice balance between the sleuthing and personal subplots. The progression of several relationships makes watching them in order advisable.

In the second, a murdered actress posed in a subterranean vampiric tableau triggers Florence’s imaginary chats with Edvard Munch for resolution. The season ends with some lingering questions but fear not. Season Seven has just aired in France, and is sure to follow the first six across the ocean.

“The Art of Crime,” in French with English subtitles, streams on MHzChoice starting May 14.

RATING: 2.5 out of 4 stars

Eléonore Bernheim as Florence and Nicolas Gob as Antoine, in the French TV crime series “The Art of Crime.” Courtesy of MHz Choice

“Captain Marleau” Season 4 – TV Series Review

Corinne Masiero in “Captain Marleau” on MHz Choice

One of the perks of increased time at home for the past few years has been discovering a slew of police/detective TV series dramas from about ten European countries. Their protagonists tend to be less action-oriented and more cerebral/intuitive than ours. Most also have some sort of family baggage or tragic backstory, making them moodier and more complex.

But in “Captain Marleau” (“Capitain Marleau”), we get a French super-cop who breaks the mold in a highly entertaining manner. Corinne Masiero’s eponymous troubleshooting Inspector Marleau has been solving knotty crimes for several years on French TV. Season 4 of her career is about to be released in the U.S. and more of her weird brilliance is just fine with me.

Tall, lanky and looking more like a forest-dwelling hobo than a cop, Marleau thrusts herself into each crime scene with the caustic wit of Dr. House, and the annoying persistence (or persistent annoyance) of Lt. Columbo. But she’s always using her abrasive in-your-face approach quite strategically. Each episode is self-contained, so it didn’t matter that I hadn’t started with the series’ 2014 debut. Those I first watched were from 2017 and 2019, as one could tell from various references and asides mentioning recent real-world events. This new quartet aired in 2022.

Each show has Marleau deployed to different villages, allowing her to irritate new sets of colleagues and parties of interest, while unraveling a mare’s nest of suspects and motives in solving their murder du jour. Though starting at the beginning is desirable, opening with these four new episodes would pose no continuity problems. The only differences from before are that her hair is grayer, and their running time is somewhat longer at around 110 minutes.

The first of these opens with a poisoned hairdresser connected to a local theater company with far more tangles among them than in all of the hairdos she’d coiffed. Their current production is “Othello,” which the script cleverly intertwines with the offstage murder. The second case gives up more of what makes Marleau tick, as she fends off department-ordered time with a shrink, ducking the doc’s overtures while nailing another killer. The third mixes financial and familial motives, both current and entailing echoes of old wounds, among the principals. The fourth stems from the actual killing of an officer in the middle of a town’s annual meticulously costumed and staged reenactment of a Napoleonic era battle, when a dueling pistol’s blank charge was given the old switcheroo with live ammo.

Though some of these might seem to have been stretched a bit to fill their time slots, the scripts still consistently deliver first-rate mixes of suspense and humor. Beyond that, it’s Masiero’s personality that makes this series stand out from the rest. The shows are generally low on overt violence and gore, and joyfully spiced up by her eccentricities. Masiero and the show have been nominated for several awards in France. She created a refreshingly engaging character who should thrive with genre fans on this side of the Atlantic as well.

“Captain Marleau” Season 4, mostly in French with English subtitles, is available streaming on July 11 on MHzChoice.

RATING: 3 out of 4 stars

“Homicide Hills” Season 3 – TV series review

Caroline Peters as Sophie, Meike Droste as Barbel and Bjarne Mädel as Dietmar, in “Homicide Hills” on MHz Choice. Courtesy of MHz Choice

The German TV crime-solving comedy series “Homicide Hills” debuts its third season on streaming service MHzChoice on June 27. Previously, I’ve reviewed the first two seasons of this German crime comedy series on this site, and in the previous seasons, Sophie Haas (Caroline Peters), a tough, brash cop from Cologne, was shipped off to become the police chief of a sleepy German village named Hengasch. Season 3 opens with Sophie’s wedding to Hengasch’s local vet. True to form, things go wildly awry, resulting in “marriage interruptus,” then morphing into another crime to solve in the series’ light-hearted fashion. Her charming father (Hans Peter Hallwachs) moves with his “nurse” to Poland, removing one of the reliable cast members from the equation. That’s a loss.

Sophie continues leading her three-member force in solving 14 episodes worth of crimes. Actually, the streaming release is 13 hour-long episodes from 2014, plus a longer movie that aired the following year to provide closure for story arcs of these now-familiar – and mostly likable – characters. There is a fourth season but it came out in 2022, with an almost totally different cast, so this batch is the swan song for our protagonist police pals.

As before, Sophie’s weekly sleuthing challenges are mixed with romantic developments and her ongoing efforts to get reassigned to the major leagues – the Cologne force from whence she came. Hengasch has too many lulls between crimes of import, so she almost jumps for joy whenever a new murder relieves the tedium. Barbel is coping with pregnancy and other personal distractions. Dietmar’s life is truly cursed when his demanding mom has to move in with him and his wife – the similarly-annoying Helga. The overkill of demands from the elder explains why he married shrewish Helga. It supports the axiom about men tending to marry women like their mothers. They’re two of a kind, and constantly compete stridently for his allegiance over the other in squabbles large and small.

The crimes and the levity surrounding them are comparable to the first two seasons, except for a bit more of the running-time focused on their personal lives. And it seems as if they stressed the comedic side more than before, including moments of madcap. But each outing continues to be cleverly written, mixing the mystery with the merriment.

A village historical event that’s re-enacted every 5 years goes awry when the pretend killing within it turns real. A safe-cracker escapes from prison, resulting in a very unusual sort of crime wave. Another involves a man killed during a parade, when it’s not clear who the bullet was meant for. The movie-length finale is a murder in a nearby village for which Sophie finds herself the main suspect. It’s presented in a RASHOMON style, alternating among the different perspectives of our principals under interrogation by another tough cop (Nina Proll), who is basically a humorless version of Sophie.

“Homicide Hills” Season 3, mostly in German with English subtitles, begins streaming on MHzChoice on Tuesday, June 27.

RATING: 2.5 out of 4 stars

UNDER LAW AND GRACE – TV series review

There have been numerous TV crime series from Europe pairing cops and clergy in the sleuthing. England’s “Father Brown” is among the best known and longest running. Italy has given us “Don Matteo,” with the superb Terence Stamp as a savvy priest. The French offering “Under Law and Grace” (“Priere D’Enquentere”) is a series of four 90-minute movies pairing police captain Elli (Sabrina Ouazani) and her assistant Franck (Jerome Robart) with novitiate monk Clement (Mathieu Spinosi) for murders with varying degrees of religious involvement. While most of these programs have been relatively light in tone, this quartet plays more as straight dramas.

The requisite initial mismatch of personalities is apparent from the get-go, as Elli, whose parents were Muslim and Jewish by birth but atheists in practice, and Franck (who is going through a messy divorce), head to a monastery. A monk was murdered, and a valuable bible was stolen. Clement has spent his entire 33 years there, having been dropped off as an infant and adopted by the caretaker, with the deceased as his mentor. Clement has studied voraciously, getting three college degrees without leaving the cloistered premises. True to form, Elli resents his involvement in the detecting until she grudgingly grows to appreciate his value. Clement gets to actually explore the outside world he’s only known through books.

Three of the four episodes involve deaths in religious settings, one in academia. For the second case, Clement has been hired by the department as a criminal psychology consultant, due to his contributions in solving the first. He does this with the blessing of his order, viewing it as part of his preparation for being ordained. For most, time in the monastery is the test period of suitability and desirability of an ascetic lifestyle. Since Clement has already spent his whole life there, experiencing the secular realm is way to an informed choice of whether he wants to commit – much like Rumspringa for Amish teens.

The four murders arise from suitably complex scenarios, with all the dangled motives and suspects needed to sustain suspense to the end. Compared to other shows, this one has a higher percentage of time spent on personal dramas and conflicts in relation to the primary task of discovering whodunnit. Franck is distracted by his romantic life. Elli has been raising her three younger sisters since their parents died years before, with one of the siblings being a particular pain in the derriere. Home-front clashes and pressures on top of the caseload make her angry most of the time, snapping impatiently at just about everyone. That’s a sharp contrast with Clement, whose beatific pleasantness and almost childlike curiosity and willingness to be of service never seem to flag. Yet beneath the grousing, Elli reveals solid love for those in her circle and dedication to her duties, to remain a protagonist we root for.

Those who shun blood and gore can relax here. None of the murders occur on-camera, and views of the victims are minimized. No nudity, either. It’s tamer than most domestic prime-time network fare in all respects. The tales should definitely be watched in order due to progression in relationships that carry over. This may not be ideal for a binge. Elli’s baseline surliness might wear thin on prolonged exposure but play better with some spacing. Clement’s character will provide enjoyment regardless of the time factor.

These productions aired from 2020-22. Though each crime is wrapped up in its episode, a few characters’ personal issues remain open, dangling a bit of grist for a fifth. Here’s hoping they decide to make it.

“Under Law and Grace” (“Priere D’Enquentere”), mostly in French with English subtitles, streams on MHz Choice starting on May 30.

RATING: 2.5 out of 4 stars

A scene from the French TV series “Under Law and Grace.” Photo credit: Fabien Malot – Mother Production. Courtesy of MHz Choice. © Cécile MELLA / FTV / MOTHER PRODUCTIONS

“Petra” – TV Series Review

Paola Cortellesi as Petra, in the Italian crime drama “Petra.” Courtesy of MHzChoice

The title of “Petra” refers to the name of the lead character in this Italian procedural TV series, Petra Delicado (Paola Cortellesi). She’s a lawyer who became a cop, though more of a desk jockey than a case-working detective. When circumstances in her Genoa department thrust her into the field for a series of ritualized rapes, she rises to the challenge, despite having almost no discernible personality, as further evidenced by her drab gray apartment with stacks of unpacked boxes to match. Even so, tough and smart is a good place to start. She’s paired with an older, street-wise subordinate, Antonio (Andrea Pennachi), who is as reactive to the emotional elements of their work as she is averse.

In the first two of the eight episodes comprising this miniseries made available for review, the pair deal with crimes and a raft of personal issues, including romantic prospects for both – not with each other. The 90-minute stories are well-written, with more stimulation for the intellect than the gut, as moments of cop-on-perp action are sparse and brief. But the direction includes lovely shots of the city and area, including some aerial views in several transition scenes that are more artistic than usual for TV productions. Same for the cool, tone-setting animations before the opening titles.

It’s hard to project how the other six episodes will turn out from this limited sample but so far, the stories are solid and the characters are becoming more interesting, individually and as a team, as they progress. Petra’s name is oddly – and likely not by coincidence – oxymoronic, since it loosely means something like “fragile rock.” That encompasses her flat affect which suggests the high-functioning end of the Autism spectrum, with an underlying vulnerability that is likely to continue thawing as we learn more of the backstories for her and Antonio. Both leads do well in establishing flawed, human-scale protagonists we can root for.

“Petra,” mostly in Italian with English subtitles, streams all eight episodes on MHzChoice starting Nov. 8.

RATING: 2.5 out of 4 stars