Rowan Atkinson assumes the mantel of Simenon's pipe-smoking French detective in ITV's new adaptation - the first of two - shown on Easter Monday. Atkinson wisely underplays the Inspector, but we found it hard to put Mr Bean and various Edmund Blackadders thoroughly behind us. All credit to him for those lasting creations, but it hindered our immersion in the lively, rather seedy Montmartre of the 1950s.
This story concerned that modern crime drama staple, the serial killer, and naturally the victims are women who happen to be out alone late at night. Maigret's team are stricken at their inability to catch the culprit, and threatened with being taken off the case, until the great man comes up with a daring ruse to smoke out the killer. Will it work, or go horribly wrong...?
An oddity, is all we can say. Ponderously slow except for a chase which feels like it was crowbarred into the midst of proceedings to liven things up. Most of it looked expensive, but the chase appeared to have been filmed on a camcorder. Maybe it's the nature of its dated source material, but the dialogue was as stilted as if it had been lifted directly from the French, and the interior scenes had the staged feel of a forgotten drawing-room play. A waste of a very good cast and some lovely couture.
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