Country:
United Kingdom
Recognizable Faces:
David Morrissey
Directed By:
James Marsh
There is a special feeling stories with a lot of scope. Events that bind lives together in unlikely fashion are often exhilarating to read. There is a method to using scope though. First of all, the lives you depict have to be interesting, even when flying solo. When the story connects, the reader/viewer will be euphoric to see both characters meet. Also, the stories have to connect in a meaningful way. This is where the second Red Riding movie fails. It's a very good story, but it's almost irrelevant to the trilogy.
The story goes like this. Closet self-loather Peter Hunter(Paddy Considine) is brought in to replace Bill Molloy (Warren Clarke) on the Yorkshire Ripper investigation. This killer has nothing to do with the first movie. He doesn't kill young girls, but prostitutes (hence, the reference to Jack The Ripper. He's been killing since 1974 and Molloy can't put the finger on him, so they bring in fresh blood. Fresh blood really? Hunter investigated on the Karachi Club Shooting in 1974, which is the even where Red Riding: In The Year Of Our Lord 1974 closes. Hunter is obviously haunted by these event...and he's also obviously handicapped by those in his current investigation. Which leads him in the similar direction that Eddie Dunsford pointed to during the first movie.
There stop the ties. The two movies have the same use. They point in the general direction of the culprits. To its discharge, Red Riding 1980 is a little clearer and anticipates the third movie, but their functions are the same. They are barely linked and Peter Hunter meets(If I can remember well) only one main character from the first movie, awesomely named male prostitute B.J (Robert Sheehan).
James Marsh is not as bold as previous director Julian Jarrold, with his vision,but it somehow serves the movie better. It's less contemplative so the narrative pace benefits from the conventional film noir approach. It illustrate the dichotomy of cinema pretty well. Do you let action or time dictate the image? I think Marsh's approach is the best suited for Red Riding because of the complexity of the plot. There is a little time for tension as there is always something to explain. Marsh draws tension often from heated discussions and bleak atmosphere, which is well achieved.
Red Riding: In The Year Of Our Lord 1980 would have shined as a stand alone movie. Unfortunately, it's the tainted part of the trilogy because it doesn't take its place. The main story, the Yorkshire Ripper hunt, is so irrelevant that main character Peter Hunter doesn't give a flying f*$@ about it. He spends the whole movie looking for answers to his Karachi Club investigation and therefore, the story offers a cheap conclusion to what the story is built around. Hats off to James Marsh for the moody movie, but that storyline is all over the place. It frustrated me more than anything.
SCORE: 71%
