Jack Irish: Bad Debts

A terrific and engaging mystery series from Australia that has a tremendous amount of style, suspense, dark humor and action. A full-on and extremely exciting Australian noir. A stunning and mesmerizing crime-drama. Guy Pearce creates one of his best characters ever in one of his most exciting performances. A thrilling piece of television. It's the real deal; great storytelling and great acting. Guy Pearce brings the late great Peter Temple's down at the heel gumshoe to life. I'll admit, when I first saw Pearce cast as Jack Irish I didn't buy it. But Pearce makes the character his own. Backed by a superb Aussie cast (special mention goes to Aaron Pedersen as the charismatic Cam) witty dialogue and some great Melbourne scenery, it's a must watch for anyone who likes stylish noir, well told.

I watched this without being aware that it is based on a book. However, I an a fan of Guy Pearce and he played this role with his usual proficiency. The story and plot were solid and engaging, and the faint touches of humour gave a well-rounded polish to a low budget title which holds its own very well.

The usual elements of a good thriller plot are there. The pub scenes were probably the best and certainly produced the most chuckles.

If there was any complaint, it would probably be that Guy Pearce was too good looking for this role, and I felt that someone moodier and beefier might have done it more justice.

Guy Pearce works beautifully with his large and superb supporting cast in Jack Irish while very much being the laid- back centre of the show. It a truly collaborative effort in terms of performances and the script allows for this by sharing around some fabulous dialogue and one-liners. Marta Dusseldorp seems just right as Linda, smart, determined but vulnerable too.

The direction is sharp and thoughtful, the design for locations and sense of place is outstanding, plus the pacing, which I would have thought would have driven the script writers up the wall in condensing from the labyrinth plots of the novel, just hums along.

Special shout-out to Roy Billing (Harry) and the wonderful Aaron Pedersen (Cam) as Jack's racing skallywag mates: the three of them operate seemingly effortlessly together in this first outing for Jack Irish, very believable. And they keep to that high level in all the subsequent episodes.

This film starts with a hiss and a roar, which seems to fizzle out rather than go out with a bang. The acting is pretty good, with a decent story line to follow - also some funny one liners here and there.

Too often it was difficult to keep up with who the main characters were talking about, as they often mentioned names of people we were expected to know, but didn't.

Perhaps the film focuses a bit too much on the main character; viewing the story from more than one perspective could have given this film more depth.

Found it interesting that all the leads he found during his detective work were more than eager to share information with a complete stranger, especially since the case he was digging up was a decade old and sensitive.

Overall a good movie. Worth seeing once, but probably not again.

From the people behind Rake, Jack Irish is the latest TV movie from Andrew Knight from Rake and SeaChange fame.

Guy Peirce is fantastic as Jack Irish.

This would be one of the few series i would recommend to non aussies.

if you like shows like rake, seachange and spooks as well as the edge of darkness.

Such a great story, full of great characters, fantastic locations, flawless cinematography and direction.

With 1 down and 3 more to go i will be keeping a close eye on Jack Irish's next adventures.

10/10