It never ceases to amaze us how much great literature is turned into mediocre television, and vice versa. Alan Furst's novels are a good read, but some things rarely change: the setting is usually WWII, the hero a jaded but moral Frenchman who is involved in dangerous espionage and abandons his womanising for a true love.... David Tennant doesn't spring to mind, not least because he looks too young to be Jean-Francois Mercier, and because the image of him as a springy Dr Who won't leave us alone. Nor do Dick Clement and Ian La Frenais spring to mind as the writers to adapt this for the screen, given their biggest successes have been in comedies like Porridge, Lovejoy and Auf Wiedersehen Pet. The music, too, veers oddly between classic war-spy-story menacing piano to suspiciously 50s sounding freeform jazz.
But somehow it works. It looks good, it sounds good, it feels scary and sad, as Europe on the brink of an abyss must have done (hmmm, not so far removed from 2013 then). Familiar faces give reliable performances (Anton Lesser is a shoe-in for a drama imagining Hitler as an elderly man), Janet Montgomery is a sweet-faced heroine and David Tennant is the actor from 'Hamlet' and not the one from 'True Love'. Worth a watch. Concluding part on 16th Jan.
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