A Disappointing Falcon

 

 

No, not the bird. Although if you were to be wanting  a picture of a falcon that would indeed be a disappointing picture, since the bird  therein is not a falcon at all, but a Harris Hawk. A falconer once told me that the Harris Hawk was the most boring bird of prey ever, since they all look, sound and behave exactly alike. Like some sort of clone.  

 

Anyway the Falon to which I am referring is the Sky TV adaptation of Robert Wilson's first two books about Chief Inspector Javier Falcon of the Seville Homicide Group. Regular readers may remember that I was lookng forward to this very much. Great cast, wonderful setting, based on a couple of excellent books; what could go wrong?

 

Well as it transpires, quite a lot. A book re-done for TV is never going to be like (for which read, probably never be as good as ) the original, but giving the scriptwriters a little more space than two hours for the first story, The Blind Man of Seville would have helped. There would have been space to establish the characters better, and to keep some of the subtleties of the relationships betwen them. And let's not kid ourselves, keep some of the subtleties, or even the major themes, of the plot.

 

Then there's the casting. On paper, it looks brilliant. (Well I had my doubts about Celeborn in the main role, but reserved judgement, since seeing someone as an Elf with very few lines and playing second fiddle to Cate Blanchett isn't the best way to assess a man's acting ability). In the event he's not up to the role; he doesn't look challenged, or sensitive, or thoughtful. He tends to look stupefied. And slow. As for the rest, I don't know if they were all affected by the Andalucian sun, but to a man (and woman) they mugged and overenunciated in a very painful way. Additionally, it's true that  the charcater of Juez Calderon is introduced in the book as being 'young'; but that's young, at 36, to be a judge. Not a good idea to have him played by a boy who doesn't look old enough even to have a law degree yet.

 

But the main problem with the cast is that they just don't look Spanish.  The way they  dress isn't Spanish, their body language isn't Spanish, just the way they walk around Seville isn't Spanish. Which is baffling considering that the series is a co-produciton with a Spanish TV channel.

 

They should have taken a leaf from the book of the people who made The Killing. Produce it in Spain with a Spanish script and Spanish actors and sell it with subtitles. Then they might have done Seville, and Robert Wilson's books, some sort of justice.