Non uccidere

These comments are based on watching the first season.

This Italian crime drama is set in the northern city of Turin and centred on Valeria Ferro. She is a detective investigating various 'murders of the week'. These tend to feature more personal motives rather than murders that take place as part of another crime.

As well as these murders there is an ongoing storyline regarding Valeria's mother. Early in the series she is released from prison having served seventeen years for the murder of Valeria's father. She has never denied the crime but her former cell mate claims she is really innocent. Valeria initially wants nothing to do with her mother but inevitably gets drawn into looking into the case. Things are somewhat complicated by the fact that her boss, who she is involved with, arrested her mother.

I really enjoyed this series; the cases of the week very much dominate the episodes but the ongoing story regarding her mother nicely serves to link the episodes and make key characters more interesting. The weekly cases are interesting and the identity of the killer isn't obvious. There are always plenty of suspects and motives to keep the viewer guessing.

Miriam Leone is solid in the role of Valeria and the supporting cast also impresses. I liked the setting; the only other Italian shows I've seen have been set further south, mostly way down in Sicily... this feels like different country. Overall I'd definitely recommend this to fans of subtitled crime drama... assuming you don't speak Italian! I hope we don't have to wait too long before season two becomes available here in the UK.

'Non Uccidere' is a rather solemn Italian detective series, set in a Turin that always feels cold, a drama that feels closer in style and substance to a Scandi-noir than to 'Inspector Montalbano'. It's well plotted, with a young-ish female detective at its centre who is stubborn but talented, quietly-spoken but unyielding to anyone. There's also a background story, not resolved even after 12 episodes, about her mother's involvement in a murder many years before. There are few moments of light relief here, or even action sequences, and it can seem slow - but I liked the fact that its heroine is neither a classical female sterotype nor an extreme opposite. I'd recommend watching it, but it might have been even better if its makers had had just a little more sense of urgency as they put it together.

We have a beautiful detective with no affect, who goes off the reservation frequently but always solves the crime in the last five minutes. Yep cookie cutter stuff. It is entertaining and the plots are well drawn out with interesting characters and it does match Denmark's "The Killing" in mood and complexity. The main character needs to be drawn out more, driven and severe can only last for so long. I suspect we are inching towards a gradual unveiling. The series could also be better at broadening the other members of the crime team, because it seems like a one trick pony crew.

The lead actress is so clearly able to think that you can see her insights and perceptions developing right onscreen.

'Non uccidere' may be the first crime series coming from Italy that I have ever seen. It's quite an unexpected source for the genre, Italian cinema being quite famous for neo-realism, for comedies, for historical dramas or for the very personal and creative movies of great directors like Fellini. We do have of course the horror stories of Dario Argento, but these are a genre by themselves. Cerebral crime stories are not what I would have considered an Italian specialty, and that is why 'Non uccidere' created by Claudio Corbucci is quite a surprise for me, and a good one, I should say.

I have watched the 12 episodes in the first two seasons, broadcast by ARTE TV, which have been realized in 2015 and 2016. There is a third season that I am yet to see but I need to find a good opportunity and some time. The episodes come in pairs of 40-45 minutes each and I suspect that some stations may have transmitted longer episodes joining two series each time. There are two plans of parallel action - one is a procedural forensics crime drama which finds its solution at the end of the second episode in the pair, the other is a longer thread also comprising a criminal element and involving the main character, police captain Valeria Ferro and her mother, out of jail after serving time for killing Valeria's father. The stories take place in Torino and around the city. I've never been to this city, but I feel that I know it a little after having seen 'Non uccidere'.

There are a lot of reasons to like these series. The stories are well written and their solutions make sense. Most of the characters are credible and acting is good. The only minus if this can be called a minus is that the lead actress Miriam Leone looks too young and too beautiful for her role. The stories tend to take place in various social medias that the script authors and episode directors seem to know quite well - working people and immigrants living in the less fortunate areas of the city, or very rich people in their sumptuous villas. One of the most interesting couple of episodes takes place in a nuns convent. The makers of the series adapted well their cinematographic tools using elements of neo-realist cinema in some of the episodes, or approaching the stories as melodramas for riches in other. Overall this forensic crime drama with touches of soap opera works quite well.