RARA-AVIS: Talking about a new series

From: Marianne Macdonald ( marianne.macdonald@lineone.net)
Date: 24 Sep 2004


I caught the first episode of DEADWOOD (by the people who do "The Sopranos") on Sky here in the UK on Tuesday. I'm sure you get it in North America too, Sky being Sky.

Apart from the amusement of seeing Lovejoy (!) in the role of the capo, an evil saloon-keeper in Deadwood ('the town where there is no law') - not to mention one of my favourite character actors, Brad Dourif, heavily whiskered, as the town doctor - the design of the thing should make it of interest to a lot of you.

Illustrates the old generic relationship between the western and crime fiction very nicely indeed.

Hardboiled: Wild Bill Hickock and an ex-sheriff from a more law-abiding place have just rolled into the mean streets, which are full of prostitutes, thugs, thieves and killers with a tendency to chop up their victims, especially women and children, into little pieces and blame it on the Indians.

Noir: could easily revive the argument. NOT shot in black and white, obviously, nor even necessarily at night, though much of it does take place in a saloon with shadows, and girls being beaten in the rooms upstairs and tucking small revolvers down their cleavage, and their customers falling headfirst over the bannisters. But many of the outdoor scenes appear to have been shot in some distant sun-drenched desert (I'm guessing the outskirts of Palm Springs?). But it IS noir, damnit.

You are warned!

Marianne Macdonald

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