Les témoins

Scandi-noir brings with it a set of expectations which Witnesses duly delivers. Female cop with suppressed issues -- check; a wintry French coastal village dominated by Broadchurch style cliffs -- check; improbable crime scenes that darkly hint at a miscreant with a messed up mind -- check, and the usual cool colour palette of blues and greys -- check.

Genre conventions are not a bad thing, if used deftly, and Witnesses delivers. Marie Dompnier as the female lead investigator, Sandra Winckler, is impressive as the astute cop who exorcises her insomniac nights by obsessively cleaning her apartment. Thierry Lhermitte plays the former high-flying policeman haunted by family tragedy, and as Winkler's former instructor who is implicated in the bizarre crime, suppresses dark secrets about his past. The location shooting in Le Tréport, with its strange funicular railway which is used as a disturbing feature in the first episode, is inspired, and the photography is superb.

This review is based on viewing the introductory episode, which sometimes tends to be dramatically the most engaging with television mini-series, such as The Bridge and its British-French counterpart, The Tunnel, but marred in subsequent weeks by a lurid story trajectory. Hopefully Witnesses will exhibit a narrative restraint where trust is placed in mood and character development without forsaking the sense of unease that is so well established in the opening hour.

French crime drama 'Witnesses' appears to take many of its cues from the superb Danish series 'The Killing': an intense, career focused, thoughtful but lonely female protagonist, with a tendency to go into dark places alone, coupled with a landscape that is always painted grey (in this case, the seaside town of Le Treport, which probably won't attract too many additional holiday makers as a result of its portrayal). Unfortuantly, there are also some problems, most notably, a complex plot that doesn't make a lot of sense. For example, it's clear that the crime under investigation involves someone seeking revenge on a retired detective, so the first thing the police do is to bring the person in question back onto the job specifically to lead the case. It's a standard trope of television detectives, of course, that they accidentally find a personal link to the case they're investigating; but it's a bit crazy to assume the reverse, that a known personal involvement would lead to someone being put in charge, especially as much of the tension in the drama comes from his own reluctance to share what he knows with his colleagues. The acting from the two leads was good, and I also liked the mood of the piece, but ultimately, the story just isn't very plausible or engaging.

Series 1 is excellent. The female lead detective, Sandra Winckler, is outstanding as she strives to prove herself in a male-dominated profession. Also outstanding is Paul Maisonneuve, the retired detective, who comes back to work with Winckler on solving a series of puzzling crimes that involve corpses being dug up and displayed in model homes. The plot slowly unfolds and comes to a satisfying conclusion in the final two episodes of Season 1. Seasons 2 is longer and during the second half, the behavior of Sandra Winckler is so unprofessional and implausible that it seriously lowers the quality of the series. Season 1 gets a 9; season 2 a 5.

As a keen follower of mostly British and Scandinavian crime dramas, I try at times to broaden my horizon and find out what other nationalities/countries have come to offer. Thanks to the site here plus Wikipedia, it is now easy to look around and see what is going on elsewhere, together with brief synopsis and comments.

As I liked Braquo and Engrenages, then Les témoins met my eye as well - and caught my attention from the very first moments. The producers are apparently the admirers of Scandinavian film noir, but this was not annoying, on the contrary - the concept, camera-work, music score and mood were catchy to follow, and the story "started working" at once, making you ponder on and over what could and would really happen. Leading characters and actors were distinct (particularly Thierry Lhermitte as former police chief Paul Maisonneuve and Marie Dompnier as police lieutenant Sandra Winckler) and the plot had interesting twists and turns, full of mysticism, but without interventions from supernatural forces; plus the nature in North-Eastern France is very different from we are used to see in French films, accentuating the similarities with Western Scandinavia and Northern England and Scotland.

All in all, a good series, and the number of episodes (6) is just right to obtain a versatile, yet not protracted and not discursive crime series.

Despite the tendency to compare it to recent offerings like The Bridge and The Tunnel etc, really you should forget those and seek to approach this with a clean slate.

We're seeing it with a head start here in Australia, and episode 2 shows that the promise is there to live beyond the initial opening episode and what are always grand setups.

Whats truly astonishing to me is that for the lead actress, Marie Dompnier, this is the first outing for her in front of a camera (i understand she is a seasoned theatre actor). She is transfixing, not only for her appealing appearance (i already have a crush, but will move beyond the superficial hereon in!), but for making her confident female detective character utterly believable. Its something of a triumph right there. She looks as though she has been acting on film for some time. I hope to see more of her in the future.

As i said, im 2 episodes in and i cannot not follow through!