Latest news with #cosycrime
Yahoo
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Do we need Bookish, yet another cosy crime?
A silhouette on flocked wallpaper. A cute transistor radio playing light jazz. A woman is dozing, slipping down the settee – no, wait – she's being dragged on to the floor, the seams of her nylons disappearing into the shadows. Sedation, abduction and murder, quite possibly, have never looked or sounded more tasteful. In our world of constant, instantly accessible horror, TV schedulers are turning more than ever to – excuse me while I gag – cosy crime . I get it. TV viewers are human. We crave shocks that activate our fight-or-flight instincts, our primitive selves. It's simply that gentler versions are nicer when the news cycle is all disaster, fascism and genocide. On UKTV's cosy crime network (and available to subscribers of Now TV ), Bookish presents itself more poshly than Midsomer Murders, Death in Paradise and the recent BBC Sunday night hit Death Valley. It is set in a strangely glossy post war London, where Mark Gatiss plays the irritatingly named Gabriel Book, who runs an antiquarian bookshop. Polly Walker plays his wife, Trottie, a shoulder-padded, vintage-clad dream who runs the wallpaper shop next door. Outside work, they help police solve crimes, although it's not clear why. We also slowly discover that their marriage is shrouded in mystery for other reasons. The first episode is slow. We're guided through it s world by newcomer Jack (Connor Finch) , a flat-cap-wearing mini Eddie Redmayne with eyes like sapphire marbles. He gets a job at the shop, even though he struggles to locate it (not because he's illiterate: he finds the apostrophe in the store's name, Book's Books, understandably challenging). He's then brought along to a crime scene that reveals itself as a previously undiscovered plague pit. As a police officer railed at the Books' arrival at the scene, questioning who Jack was, while another officer encouraged the amateurs' deductions, my TV recall siren went off. A very similar setup occurs in the first episode of the BBC 's Sherlock, co-written by Gatiss . Why change a winning formula? We're then whisked along to a suicide that might be a murder. Mentions of the war's effects on the city add an intriguing texture to the plot. But what makes cosy crime really zing is the characters who lead it. In the first few episodes, Gabriel Book's camp pedantry clearly aims towards David Suchet's reading of Poirot in the classic ITV series that ran for 24 years. His bon mots – 'Loose lips drop slips' – feel heavy-handed, however. Trottie's sexy matriarch is a much more intriguing figure, and even better is part-time bookseller Nora (Buket Kömür) . All quickfire wit, she makes the screen shimmer every time she appears. Bookish presents itself more poshly than Midsomer Murders, Death in Paradise and the Sunday night hit Death Valley Jump forward to the present day, and more than 5,000 miles west , to the Yosemite National Park , where – surprise! – there's another mysterious death to investigate. Untamed is Netflix's latest brooding, US-set drama, although Australian and New Zealand actors lead it. Eric Bana, 22 years on from playing the Hulk, is 56 and in his moody, silver- fox era. He plays surly national parks special agent Kyle Turner, a man at his happiest when crossing the wilderness on a horse. Sam Neill, clearly in his kindly grandad era, plays Paul Souter, his boss. Written by Mark L Smith ( screenwriter of The Revenant and Twisters ) and Elle Smith, this is the kind of show made for huge, wall-mounted screens. Craggy landscapes loom and ache, while episode one's opening climbing scene is not for the acrophobic. Turner suddenly has a young woman's death on his hands and he's given a rookie agent, Naya Vasquez (played by the sparky Lily Santiago) , to work with. Yes, there are clich es here, but Santiago brings a welcome levity to the role. There are also some bold visual tricks. A twist late in the opener is nicely done, as are jump cuts between Turner's explorations and the victim's last moments. Is he imagining them or is the park revealing its own memories? If the series continues to plough these deeper, weirder furrows, it may work. Mix Tape is a summer romance set in Sheffield and Sydney. It follows fortysomething music journalist Daniel O'Toole (Jim Sturgess) , who's reminded of the first love of his life, Alison Connor (Teresa Palmer) , after his best friend finds out about her success as a novelist. Here's a generation X-er in mid life, still writing about arts and culture, trying to defend their life choices. Ouch. Scenes slip and slide easily between the present and the past as we learn about each character. Alison's complex backstory unfolds gradually. At one point in Australia, she chats worriedly to her literary agent on a park bench, watching kids play football. A whistle blows, and she's a teen back in school watching a young Daniel (a pitch-perfect Rory Walton-Smith) swearing as he misses a goal. Florence Hunt, playing the young Alison, has the crackle and glow of a star in the making. In the post-Normal People era of more explicit romantic dramas, Mix Tape feels old-fashioned, sweet and slightly cloying – like a striped bag of lemon sherbets. Nevertheless, I loved the close ups of ballpoints scrawling on inlay cards and bedroom floors strewn with C90s (under-35s, ask your parents). Despite clunky dialogue, improbable plot points (surely we all befriended our teenage exes on Facebook nearly 20 years ago?) and too many shots of people gazing into the distance, there are some nice subtle details. The links between his situation and his parents' relationship emerge slowly. And Alison's husband marks himself out as definitely not her indie boy by singing Mental As Anything's 1985 cringe-fest Live It Up. Jude Rogers's watch list Human (BBC Two) This ambitious new BBC/PBS co-production, hosted by the engaging British palaeoanthropologist Ella Al-Shamahi (below) , takes us 'behind the curtain of evolution', stuffing us full with cutting-edge science. Shark! Celebrity Infested Waters (ITVX) It sounds like a fevered Alan Partridge programme pitch, with a title that implies the toothy fish should be more afraid of the stars. But this bizarre show comes alive thanks to endearing contestants such as Lucy Punch (Amandaland) and Lenny Henry . The Great British Sewing Bee (BBC One) Sara Pascoe returns from maternity leave (another task, she says, that involves 'labour, love and careful stitching') to host the 11th series of TV's warmest show, cosying up to sustainable fashion guru Patrick Grant and designer Esme Young. Photographs by Nicolas Velter; Netflix
The Guardian
16-07-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Bookish review – Mark Gatiss's cosy crime drama is a tasty nugget of absolute delight
You may feel that your cosy crime dance card is full. You've done all the Richard Osmans, polished off Ludwig and that new Timothy Spall one, Death Valley, not as bleak as it sounds, and of course there's Father Brown to fall back on when you are ill and Agatha Raisin when you need cheering up. You're good. But … as with a delicious box of chocolates, which is to say any box of chocolates, there's always room for one more, isn't there? And here it is, your next flavoursome nugget of absolute delight – Bookish. This six-part detective drama was created by Mark Gatiss, written by Matthew Sweet and stars the former as Gabriel Book, a secondhand bookseller in postwar London. He carries a mysterious 'letter from Churchill' as a result of his equally mysterious service in the war and this allows him to lend a hand with any passing police investigation that catches his eye. Think of him as a legitimised semi-Sherlock if you wish. In the opening double bill, Slightly Foxed – the perfect and inevitable pun under the circumstances – the eye-catching investigation involves a plague pit uncovered at a bombsite, the apparent suicide of a local chemist via prussic acid and a lavish strewing of clues (at least one of which Book finds almost too obvious, which makes it another kind of clue altogether) and complications (missing morphine, a bloodied head but no broken skin, on top of a poisoning? Rum, old boy, altogether rum). Possible suspects include the pharmacist's semi-estranged daughter and her spiv boyfriend, the erstwhile ARP warden, Rosie Cavaliero's char lady (called Mrs Dredge to give us some Dickensian undertones to enjoy) and there are red herrings (and jade figurines) and period detail along the way. The latter ranges from the pleasingly traditional (whistleblowing bobbies, meat as a luxury item, the prevalence of powdered egg), through to the still more pleasingly niche (Georgette Heyer fandom and Book's refusal to indulge it) and on to the more difficult aspects of life in 1946 England: orphaned children making the best of new circumstances, the sweeping away of old certainties as the shellshocked population waits to see if something better or worse will rise from the rubble, the pride and sorrow attached to war heroes and those who had to care for the injured ones when they came home. Bookish delivers a ripping yarn, yes, but grief and melancholy undercut it at many turns. Alongside the self-contained plot, we have the slower burn of what precisely is going on in Book's life. He is married to Trottie (Polly Walker) and they clearly love each other dearly but sleep apart. They have recruited a young man to help in the shop while Gabriel sleuths. Jack (Connor Finch) is an orphan with no memories of his mother and only a single picture of his father, fresh out of a two-year stint in prison for his part as the getaway driver in a smash-and-grab raid in Mayfair. There are signs that the Books have taken him under their wing for motives other than altruism. There are also (God, Walker remains such a magnificent danger) signs that Mrs Book may have a taste for younger men which, if they come to fruition, will require a subcategory of cosy crime to be hastily instituted so we'll need to keep an eye on that. I don't think it counts as a spoiler to say that one gently unspooling thread of Bookish is an exploration of Book's life as a necessarily closeted gay man. It adds to the sense of sorrow that infuses the series and gives it heft, and warms the edges of Book as a character and of Gatiss – customarily quite a closed and chilly actor – to a valuable degree. There are a few tricky moments – I'm not sure I buy an opportunistic theft by a man who just happens to be carrying around a jade chess set, or why he would leave a piece behind as an entirely unconvincing substitute for a stolen figurine. I feel, too, that we could do with finding some way other than battles about apostrophe placement to demonstrate a character's intellectual superiority. But overall Bookish is a fine piece of entertainment – meticulously worked, beautifully paced and decidedly moreish. (It was commissioned for a second series before the first began.) It has enough spikiness to stop it being formulaic but enough love for the genre to keep it comforting. A joy. Bookish is on U&Alibi
Telegraph
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Telegraph
Sexual assault and drink driving – cosy crime but not as we know it
A puzzle-setter turns sleuth in a quirky British crime series. Stop me if you think you've heard this one before. Murder Most Puzzling is trying to be Ludwig, which was a hit for the BBC last year. But it's a pale imitation. While that one was a five-star treat starring David Mitchell, this one is a two-star rip-off starring Phyllis Logan. The missteps start as soon as we are introduced to her character, Cora Felton. Cora is The Puzzle Lady, a crossword compiler whose job has made her so famous that she has her own range of biscuits and TV adverts. Let's not pause to ponder how unlikely that is. She is called in to investigate the case of a young woman found murdered in a churchyard, with a mysterious crossword clue in her pocket. Unfortunately, Cora can't make head nor tail of the clue when she first sees it because she's still sozzled from the night before. When we first meet her, she is passed out at the wheel of her car after a spot of drink-driving. Drink-driving? Really? We're supposed to find this quirkily amusing, but it strikes the wrong tone right away. It's a sign that the show doesn't quite know what it's supposed to be. This is cosy crime, yet having someone at a town hall meeting ask if the murder victim was sexually assaulted belongs in a grittier police drama. At least the mystery is wrapped up in a feature-length episode rather than being dragged out. The show is based on a book series by Parnell Hall and the failings of the TV series are odd because its writer, Dominique Moloney is a veteran of Father Brown and The Sister Boniface Mysteries. Some bits do conform to the cosy crime template: jaunty music, a picturesque setting in the fictional market town of Bakerbury (it's Lisburn in Northern Ireland), and the odd silly character, such as the blustering mayor in a cravat who runs the local police force. The programme's saving graces are the three lead performances. Logan, best known as Mrs Hughes in Downton Abbey, is a safe pair of hands and does her best with the material. Charlotte Hope is a bright spot as Cara's niece and right-hand-woman, Sherry. And Adam Best is, well, the best thing here as DCI Derek Hooper, who has never worked a murder case before and reluctantly turns to Cora for help. There is a twist halfway through relating to Cora's job, and if you didn't see it coming then I'm afraid your sleuthing skills are a little below par.
The Sun
14-06-2025
- Entertainment
- The Sun
Win a copy of A Novel Murder by E.C. Nevin in this week's Fabulous book competition
THIS deliciously fun cosy-crime novel is perfect weekend reading. When author Jane Hepburn arrives at the Killer Lines book festival, she knows it's her chance to get her book noticed. But then she stumbles upon the body of reviled literary agent Carrie Marks and finds herself playing detective for real. . . 10 lucky Fabulous readers will win a copy of this new novel in this week's book competition. To win a copy, enter using the form below by 11:59pm on June 28, 2025. For full terms and conditions, click here.
Irish Times
26-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Times
Death Valley review: Timothy Spall effortlessly commands the screen but this BBC drama struggles
When did we decide we preferred our television detectives sunny-side up rather than served in the traditional hard-boiled fashion? At whatever point it happened, we nowadays live, beyond all hope of escape, in a cosy crime purgatory, where murder is a green light for jolly japes, and the only good cop is a whimsical one. Cosy crime isn't new. It extends back to Agatha Christie in the 1920s and even to Wilkie Collins in the 19th century. But goodness, is it having a moment now – whether manifesting as cosy crime in the sun (Death in Paradise), cosy crime marinated in the cheesy values of 1980s US television (Poker Face) or cosy crime in upper-west-side Manhattan (Only Murders in the Building). Alas, like a killer driven to ever more desperate extremes in the hope of attracting attention, the genre has lately arrived at the 'trying-too-hard' stage of its cycle, as evidenced by the distractingly offbeat Death Valley ( BBC One, Sunday) – a capricious caper that cannot make up its mind whether to celebrate the tropes of the milieu or poke fun at them. [ The Last of Us finale review: A nerve-shredding, bloody conclusion that leaves us wanting more, and soon Opens in new window ] The setting of small-town Wales is in the classic British tradition of dramedies taking place off the beaten track (see also: Shetland, Vera, Midsommar Murder or, in ancient times, Wicklow-set Ballykissangel). It stars veteran Timothy Spall as a reclusive actor once famous for playing a television detective (one gathers his character was a cross between Taggart and Bergerac). He's content in his solitude, with only his cat for the company – until a local bigwig seemingly shoots himself, and the police are called in. READ MORE Timothy Spall (left) plays John Chapel, with Gwyneth Keyworth as Janie Mallowan in Death Valley. Photograph: BBC/BBC Studios/Simon Ridgway Spall earned his reputation with gritty character parts in unsentimental State of the Nation films such as Secrets and Lies by Mike Leigh (who would go on to cast him as the painter JMW Turner in a 2014 biopic). However, it is whimsy all the way in Death Valley, where his character, John Chapel, quickly joins forces with local police officer Janie Mallowan (Gwyneth Keyworth). They're an odd pairing though you wonder how much of this is on purpose and how much has to do with the baffling decision to make Janie a devoted dispenser of gags. She's forever firing off pithy observations and commenting on life around her, whether or not anyone else has asked her to upend the contents of her brain all over their conversation. Her backstory contains its share of loss, and her outré personality is presumably a coping mechanism – unfortunately, Death Valley doesn't make any of this feel plausible. For instance, in an early scene where she and John meet in a coffee shop to compare notes, she explains that she's reading an online piece about 'washed-up celebs and what they look like today'. She reveals that John is mentioned. But when he inquires further, she says she's only joking. Well, that's going to bring him around to her side, isn't it? The actual mystery is solid. The dead businessman, Carwyn Rees, did not, in fact, take his own life. He was done in by people close to him amid murky dealings in his building development company and an illicit affair (or three) on the side. Here, Death Valley holds up – in so far as you can understand the motives of the perpetrators and the means by which the ghastly deed was carried out. That sets it apart from popular rivals such as Death in Paradise, where the big reveal about that week's murder invariably raises more questions than it answers. The problem is ultimately one of tone. Death Valley wants to be flighty as anything and also have the crunchy qualities of a solid sleuth fest. It is well-intentioned and thoughtfully plotted while Spall effortlessly commands the screen as a fading luvvy who just so happens to be a top-rank crime buster in real life. But some things simply don't go well together. Now we know that this category includes off-beam humour and dark deeds in small-town Wales. The six-part series is on BBC One on Sundays from 8.15pm
