The eight English series you will (perhaps) love

From the sensational “Killing Eve” to the brilliant “The Split”, a look back at the many British productions presented at the French CanneSéries and Séries Mania 2018 festivals. Between post-Brexit dramas and delirious conceptual comedies, they display as always an original tone and an undeniable audacity.

“Killing Eve” (BBC America and soon Canal+)

Even though it is broadcast on BBC America, the amazing new series by Phoebe Waller-Bridge (Fleabag) is British all the way nails. This game of cat and mouse between an MI5 employee (the Canadian Sandra Oh, impeccable) and a terrifying psychopath (our darling Jodie Comer, noticed in Dr Foster and Thirteen), is of a crazy class. Violent, fun, chic, smart and pop, the series is a thrilling thriller, with bursts of tongue-in-cheek humor. The lively rhythm, Swinging London style crossed with the New Wave, is enhanced with dialogues with Godardian accents from the period Une femme est une femme ("Who is a woman?"), French music beyond cool (Anna Karina of course, Françoise Hardy, Brigitte Bardot) and an archi groovy soundtrack by David Holmes, sidekick to Steven Soderbergh. Already formidable in Fleabag, Waller-Bridge's regenerating "female gaze" makes Killing Eve a feminist pamphlet that discreetly plays on the reversal of ossified male/female roles and the permanent destabilization of male power. An elegant entertainment, terribly pleasing, which casually changes our outlook.

“The Split” (BBC One)

This luminous story of four women from the same family, three of whom are legal counsel specializing in divorces, is a true delight of deeply human comedy-drama. A post-Brexit fiction on divisions, life choices and worn out loves, formally exciting (sparkling dialogues, constantly moving camera), which does not hesitate to scratch its sparkling varnish to expose the contradictory emotions of its protagonists, including Hannah, played by the essential Nicola Walker. Full review here.

“Come home” (BBC One)

Englishman Danny Brocklehurst is capable of very good (Shameless), good (The Driver) and mediocre (Safe, for Harlan Coben). This drama in three episodes, about a woman who abandons her husband and children for no apparent reason, easily falls into the first category. Rarely has reflection on the reasons for the heartbreak of a couple been so subtle and complex, alternating the points of view of each party to better make us doubt. All treated as a thriller with twists and turns, with a harsh and brutal staging, close to the body and at the height of the heart. An intense drama, which does not shrink from any taboo, with Paula Malcolmson and Christopher Eccleston, both breathtaking.

“Kiri” (Channel 4)

Winner of the International Panorama Prize at Series Mania, this complex miniseries on adoption and the prejudices of British society, directed by Jack Thorne (Sacred Monster), and with a still formidable Sarah Lancashire, had already hit us in the eye when it airs this winter on Channel 4. Full review here.

“The City and the City” (BBC Two)

Screenwriter Tony Grisoni (Southcliffe, The Man Who Killed Don Quixote) adapts the dystopian noir novel by China Miéville in this miniseries on a territory imaginary European, cut into two towns, Beszel and Ul Qoma. To avoid conflicts, the inhabitants have literally learned not to see those who live on the other side. It is in this strange context that Inspector Tyador Borlu investigates the murder of a student from Ul Qoma whose body was discovered in Beszel. Evoking as much the Berlin Wall as the withdrawal into oneself of Brexit, the story of this worn-out cop tormented by his past (David Morrissey, all in beard and mustache) has been seen a thousand times. The thwarted twinness of the places in which it evolves is, on the other hand, fascinating and allows this sticky thriller to address important political and social issues (extremism, the migrant crisis, security abuses). Each city has its own visual signature. The messy Beszel is bathed in a magnificent faded yellow, like a forgotten postcard, and the angular Ul Qoma in a cold and sanitized blue. The staging skilfully plays on the blur, the reflections and the effects of symmetry to illustrate the topographic schizophrenia of the whole. Will the two cities succeed in looking each other in the face?

“Kiss me first” (Channel 4 and soon Netflix)

After Skins, Bryan Elsley returns to examine the torments of youth, this time through the prism of escape through virtual worlds. Leila, 17, finds herself alone after the death of her mother and tries to hide her grief by playing an online game, Azana. She will discover a secret society within this parallel reality, in which young people share hidden pain, until a tragedy occurs. The series depicts the despair of characters taking refuge in a utopian place, which works like a drug. Mysterious, bewitching, with dreamy shots and superb music, and despite scenes in old-fashioned computer graphics (we are far from Ready Player one), Kiss me first is a beautiful series on mourning, the supposed death of the opposite social bond to the desire to feel a drive for life again. As often for lonely souls, the hope of freeing oneself from its traumatic burdens will take the form of love.

“High & Dry” (Channel 4)

Unknown in France, Marc Wootto has been on the sets of English comedy series with his gallery of characters for fifteen years. He created the pilot of High & dry three years ago and the sequel finally lands this year on Channel 4. The story of these five survivors of a plane crash, prisoners of a desert island, is not in fine humor but nevertheless a joyfully stupid recreation, thanks to dreadful characters, with exacerbated character traits (the passive aggressive steward in need of affection, the stilted pensioner, the bigot convinced of being punished by divine punishment…). All evoking Lost, Alone in the world, The Last Man on earth… even Koh-Lanta.

“Action Team” (ITV 2)

Another comedy written and performed by an actor, Tom Davis, Action Team is a slick parody of a high-tech spy film, endowed with significant resources. It follows the perilous missions of an MI6 team, made up of a nymphomaniac agent, a fanatic of the trigger, an intern (!) and their leader, as stupid as he is full of himself. The discrepancy between the “serious” action scenes and the schoolboy, even gravelly tone is all the salt of this series which is furiously reminiscent of Austin Powers (like Mike Myers, Davis plays the role of hero and villain!).