The Returned / Les Revenants (Canal+, 2012-)

Started by Mel, September 07, 2013, 12:25:35 PM

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Mel

Teaser:



Synopsis:

In a small Alpine village, in the shadow of a vast dam, a small group of men, women and children find themselves in a state of confusion, trying to return to their homes. What they do not yet know is that they have been dead for several years, and no one is expecting them back.

Their arrival coincides with a series of gruesome murders which bear a chilling resemblance to the work of a serial killer from the past. This is a homecoming like no other.

Personal take:

I like to explore European TV from time to time. Good shows are produced in Britain, Scandinavia and in France, just harder to find than celebrated stuff from US cable. The Returned is such show I discovered recently.

It somehow resembles mixture of Lost, Twin Peaks and Carnivale:

  • Ensemble cast.
  • Every episode starts with flash back.
  • Set in small Alpine city with some strange characters.
The Returned is definitely a premium cable show: not much swearing, but plenty of nudity including full front male nudity. Violence and sex are subtle I would say, still they work.

Creepy is the word I would use to describe series: strange little boy, suicides, live burial... you name it (won't describe much than that - easy to spoil). The Returned probably could be classified as horror: it is very tense, but without usual gimmicks (no scare jumps and so on). Mystery is dosed in fine grained manner.

Music and cinematography. Original music with minimal, but memorable themes - I love it. It is also one of the best looking shows I've seen. Someone knows where to put camera. The Returned is cut slowly compared to average TV, but there is reason behind it: great compositions and framing (it screams for still photography).

I warn about one thing: eight episodes of season one end up with cliffhanger and will leave you with more questions than answers. I'm not convinced that season two will resolve any of it. If you hated Lost, better stay off (my wounds healed since Lost finale, so I'm willing to gamble again).

Still not sure? Just watch first episode. It is one of the best pilots (not technically pilot) I've seen: it is unusual for me to get chills from it. Ended up binge watching first season in two parts.
Simple mind - simple pleasures...

mogwai

I enjoyed this show although it kind of got repetitive towards the end of the first season. Great music as well. From a band called Moghai or Mugwhy. I think. ;)

Mel

Quote from: Christian on September 07, 2013, 02:24:12 PM
I enjoyed this show although it kind of got repetitive towards the end of the first season.

Too much time spend with redheads (that was repetitive for me)... at least I enjoyed the moment, when one redhead was punished for exploiting her purpose.
Simple mind - simple pleasures...

mogwai

Quote from: Mel on September 07, 2013, 03:16:06 PM
Quote from: Christian on September 07, 2013, 02:24:12 PM
I enjoyed this show although it kind of got repetitive towards the end of the first season.

Too much time spend with redheads (that was repetitive for me)... at least I enjoyed the moment, when one redhead was punished for exploiting her purpose.

I remember that moment although it was a while ago since I saw it. And I'd like to stress that the music in the teaser above is not by Mogwai btw. :)

Mel

Quote from: Christian on September 08, 2013, 02:52:52 AM
And I'd like to stress that the music in the teaser above is not by Mogwai btw. :)

Didn't find anything better. Here is beautiful and memorable opening of The Returned with Mogwai music:

Simple mind - simple pleasures...

Mel

Pick your review.

The Thinking Dead: 'The Returned' Is a Zombie Show With (Delicious) Brains
via Criticwire

When a headline in yesterday's Hollywood Reporter asked, "The Walking Dead Is TV's No. 1 Show -- Why Aren't Its Stars More Famous?" I couldn't resist an easy retort: Because they're terrible actors. But the answer has less to do with the actors themselves, some of whom have done good work elsewhere, than the show itself, which puts far more care into devising innovative "kills" than developing its characters.

Given the vogue for all things undead, it's not surprising that The Returned, an eight-part series that begins its run on Sundance Channel tonight, has been positioned as show about zombies. (Episodes will be available on digital platforms the following day.) But despite the fact that it's about a small French town whose dead inexplicably return to life, it has far more in common with The Sweet Hereafter or Broadchurch -- or even "The Monkey's Paw" -- than Night of the Living Dead.

Early in The Returned not long after a bus full of schoolchildren plummets off the side of a mountain road, the camera moves in quietly on a glass case filled with butterflies, their lifeless forms neatly pinned and perfectly displayed. And then, one butterfly's wing begins to beat, slowly at first, and then frantically, until the glass shatters and it heads towards the light.

It's a striking image, and one that I suspect will resonate all through the series, which critics have been giving rave reviews. The Returned, which is adapted from Robin Campillo's 2004 film, They Come Back, is as beautiful as it is disturbing, built around an idea that is appealing in the abstract but terrifying in execution: What if the dead came back? What if your teenage daughter, or the man you loved, returned to you, years or even decades past the time you'd learned to reckon with the grief of their loss? Would it seem like a miracle, or might you secretly, in a place you won't admit even to yourself, wish they'd go back to being dead?

Fair warning: Critics were provided with all of The Returned's first season -- a second is already in the works -- and most of the reviews delve into details that are hinted at but not explained in the first episode. But even without clicking through, these excerpts should offer plenty of evidence that it's a show you need to be watching.

Brian Lowry, Variety:

To call The Returned a zombie story is actually something of a misnomer, since it's really a tale of grief and loss -- and a rumination on life and death -- with a creepy undercurrent running through it.

Alison Willmore, Indiewire:

The focus here isn't on the threat posed by the returned dead, but on the disruption and trauma of having someone whose permanent absence you've learned to live with suddenly back, unaltered, in the same mindset as he or she was when last alive.

Melissa Maerz, Entertainment Weekly:

Deep down, this is a drama about nostalgia. Beautifully shot and darkly lit, in muted blues and greys, it looks more like a surreal memory than real life.

Alan Sepinwall, HitFix:

What makes The Returned so special is how raw and honest each individual reaction feels. It is a miraculous, deeply unsettling situation that is grounded by the performances, and by the show's focus on emotion above all else.

Robert Lloyd, Los Angeles Times:

There is none of the supernatural math that underlies many such stories (Indian burial ground + suburban tract = Poltergeist), or any sub-biblical gobbledygook. When dead characters talk about heaven or the afterlife here, they are improvising for the benefit of the living; when the living get biblical, we see them as misguided.

Tim Goodman, Hollywood Reporter:

The Returned deftly nails all the emotions you'd imagine and doesn't gloss over them. It's not like Claire and Jerome are just going to freak out for five minutes and then be fine about it. They are, for a very long time, spooked out and also overcome with happiness simultaneously. And they are well aware that it's not like they can just go to the market with Camille. Pierre realizes this is some kind of miracle, but you get the sense that he's been expecting it and perhaps planning for it (he has, but not in ways your cynical mind might leap to).

Todd VanDerWerff, A.V. Club:

The mood develops exquisitely from the first frame. Filmed in the French Alps, the series' locations have a unique look, one that utilizes the outdoor surroundings and barren outposts of such an isolated town. Though it possesses several moving dialogue scenes, The Returned is never afraid to go silent for long periods of time -- to simply observe its characters, both living and dead, adjusting to what their lives have become. The series boasts some haunting imagery: a church steeple poking out above a placid lake's surface; a young woman bathed in a pool of light, waiting for something horrible to happen. An excellent, brooding score by post-rock outfit Mogwai adds to the gloom.

Mo Ryan, Huffington Post:

Like most good horror fare -- or at least the horror fare I enjoy -- at its core, The Returned grapples with emotional conundrums that resist easy solutions. One of the earliest scenes of the series depicts a support group for parents of dead children, and with capable assurance in that sequence and others, The Returned establishes how difficult it has been for people to move on from devastating losses and paralyzing grief.

James Poniewozik, Time:

The Returned also an expertly suspenseful thriller -- but one where part of the thrill is learning, only gradually, what kind of thriller it is. The Returned's refusal to explain the resurrections adds to the disorienting feeling that one is walking through a dream.

Willa Paskin, Slate:

Unlike with zombie stories, the problem with The Returned's resurrected is not that they are undead -- it is that they are all too alive. When Camille's mother (Anne Consigny) finds her in the kitchen, she does none of the things you might expect: She does not scream, she does not embrace her child, she does not call the police, she does not walk away imagining that she is hallucinating, she does not even smile. Instead, she nervously behaves as if everything is normal, moving and speaking carefully so as not to frighten her daughter away. Camille has only just appeared, but instantaneously her mother intuits that she can, now, horribly, be lost again.
Simple mind - simple pleasures...

03

uh...



edit: while typing this post pointing out that this directly, title included, ripped off 'they came back' (english title), i found out that this is actually a legit tv version of the film. im a dumbass. the movie is amazing though, watch it.

Sleepless

This is now on Netflix.

Watched the pilot last night. Best damn hour of TV I've seen since Breaking Bad.
He held on. The dolphin and all the rest of its pod turned and swam out to sea, and still he held on. This is it, he thought. Then he remembered that they were air-breathers too. It was going to be all right.