What to watch: ‘Peaky Blinders’ fans will love this gritty British boxing drama
This week, we’re reviewing a gritty Hulu period drama from the maker of “Peaky Blinders” and a melancholy look at three floundering middle-age marriages.
Each offer rewards — read on.
“A Thousand Blows”: Fans of Steven Knight’s catchy period crime drama “Peaky Blinders” will find many of the trademark elements that turned that series into such a compelling success in this six-part series. Knight convincingly takes us back to the grimy, scuzzy streets of 1880s East London for a showdown in and out of the boxing ring. Each major character in Knight’s Dickensian universe exists on the fringes and shadows of society with many picking pockets and more in order to survive. Entering that dire existence are two Jamaican friends, Hezekiah (Malachi Kirby), who wants to be a lion tamer, and Alec (Francis Lovehall). Both men know how to box without their gloves on. They immediately get acquainted with the pilfering ways of the Forty Elephants (a female-led group that deals in robbery and sex work). Led by the perpetually unphased Mary Carr (a well-cast Erin Doherty), this consortium has devised an elaborate plan to steal from royalty during a Chinese leader’s visit. (Mary, incidentally, is based on a real character) Humming in the richly realized period detail background is a biblical story about two brothers — the battering bull of a boxer Sugar Goodson (a fierce and volatile Stephen Graham) and his bro, his promoter, pub/ring co-owner and lesser-known boxer Edward “Treacle” Goodson (James Nelson-Joyce). Hezekiah’s arrival leads to an escalating feud between him and Sugar who, when unleashed, beats competitors into a bloody pulp. “A Thousand Blows” builds to a climax as secrets get revealed and motivations become circumspect. It’ll leave you dangling and begging to jump into its ring once more. Details: 3 stars out of 4; all six episodes drop Feb. 21 on Hulu.
“Millers in Marriage”: One character sums up everything you need to know about director/writer and co-star Edward Burns’ latest glossy melodrama, this one about midlife adults in crisis and the relationships that sometimes get abandoned in the process. In it, Gretchen Moll, who plays Eve, a woman unhappily married to a narcissistic drunk, quietly remarks: “I can kind of relate to that.” For viewers of a certain age that sentiment asserts itself every so often in Burns’ uneven but rewarding soap opera about tangled relationships unraveling and some new beginnings for lovers, both together and apart. Throughout his career, Burns has had a knack for making us identify not so much with his characters, per se, but the fraught feelings they are often fumbling to express. That is the film’s greatest asset; the ability to convey an emotional deja vu. But some of it is just too clumsy, in particular any scene with the boorish Scott (Patrick Wilson), Eve’s alcoholic music producer hubby. The scenes need to be reshot. Eve’s storyline improves when she re-runs into the sexy and very forward Johnny (Benjamin Bratt), setting up a personal and moral dilemma for the mom and still married woman who has put her dreams on the backburner.
The other “Millers” sibling storylines are better developed and less one-note. Eve’s sis Maggie (Julianna Margulies), a novelist who dips into her personal life liberally for inspiration, bickers a lot with her judgmental but fawning husband Nick (Campbell Scott), a novelist bitten by the writer’s block. Temptation arrives, not in a wine bottle (everyone in this movie spills the tea while drinking big pours) but in another man.
The most successful storyline is the film’s most complicated one, with recently separated Andy (Burns) — Eve’s and Maggie’s brother — becoming more involved with the very likable Renee (Minnie Driver). The problem is Andy’s flirtatious and inappropriate ex Tina (Morena Baccarin). She lingers around like bad breath.
“Millers in Marriage” is unapologetic about it being focused on the woes of rich folk, but at least it is self-aware as it plunges into awkward relationship issues that often pertain to empty nesters and will likely strike a chord for so many. Details: 2½ stars; in select theaters, also available to rent online.
Contact Randy Myers at soitsrandy@gmail.com.