Marseille

I  have yet to maximise the potential of Netflix as I am put off by any American movie mogul company. However after catching the excellent US Presidency documentary which I reviewed I decided to investigate further. I was talking about Gerard Depardieu to a French friend  of mine and she recommended this 8 episode series to me. Depardieu stars as Robert Taro , Mayor of Marseille for 20 years. After overseeing his last great project the development of the marina with a casino he intends to hand over office to his deputy and protege Lucas Barres ( Benoit Magelin).  However at a crucial meeting Barres votes against the project. Taro then decides to run against him as mayor.

The real star is Marseille, France’s second city. We see the beauty of Marseille, its harbour and hillside villas with their pools as well as the the sink estates of the quarter Nord where drug gangs are rife . Drugs play a big role in the drama. Taro takes cocaine, his journalist daughter likes her joints as much as sex with another young African drug dealer. It’s essentially a political drama, the electoral campaign with both Barres and Taro playing dirty. It’s Borgen with a Hollywood makeover. The director Siri plied his trade with the Bruce Willis film Hostage. 

I started watching and soon became addicted but as with any addiction you continue beyond the point of enjoy,meant  or satisfaction. By episode 4 I was irritated by the filming of the villas always followed by the sink estates,  a melodramatic plot that stretched belief and some crude acting. When I returned to one to two episodes at a time I began to admire it more. It had the standard ingredients for a series; a heavyweight in every sense actor: a heady cocktail of violence, sex and drugs.  It lacked the subtlety  of The Sopranos when often the main drama was in the middle and the end just tailed off. Depardieu gave a masterly performance, the close up of his face was particularly effective and was utterly convincing as the city boss ready for one more fight but concerned by his family breaking apart as he always put his political career first. His main love is Marseille.

With blockbuster films with a cadre of leading actors demanding a share of the box office and a marketing budget of $100m HBO and Netflix who have just released the Crown look to be where future film making and production lies.