Ackley
Bridge: Series Two
(2018*)/Sara Stein - From
Berlin to Tel Aviv: The Complete Series
(2019/Film Movement DVD Set)/Trial
& Retribution: The Complete Collection
(1997 - 2008/*both Acorn DVD Sets)
Picture:
B/C/C Sound: C Extras: D/D/C Main Programs: B+/C+/B-
Now
for some more import TV arriving on U.S. DVD...
Not
too long ago, we looked at the debut season of the politically
conscious drama Ackley Bridge, which you can read about among the TV
shows covered here...
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/15177/The+Accident+(2006+-+2007)/Ackley+Bridge:+Se
Well,
welcome back to the second term of Ackley Bridges College, a small
town school with an integrated British and Pakistani population. As
the school continues to have culture clashes between the students and
teachers, they have begun integration, but they still face challenges
such as racism, prejudice and hate. As the students struggle to
learn, the teachers struggle to keep the school open and their
parents who are are involved with the school activities and
neighborhood projects in Ackley
Bridge: Series Two
(2018).
Ackley
Bridge is story about the school, it's teachers, students and
parents where there is constant drama between the right wing
conservatives and the liberals, between the British and Pakistani,
but school is tough enough on top of racism, genius Pakistani girl
Nasreen hides that she is a lesbian and her best
friend/next-door-neighbor Missy the tough/street smart girl (who is
also failing in school) along with their friends and family who are
considered to be living in the 'ghetto'. Along with the various
teachers and the principal, Ackley Bridges is considered a poor and
failing school for low scoring students and in financial danger of
closing. The parents and teachers mean well and try to teach the
students to study, work hard and become respectable. But the adults
however are poor examples themselves of being 'respectable', they
have sex behind closed doors and scandalous affairs.
In
this season, Nasreen has a sham engagement to hide her lesbianism but
then discovers her father has second family in the next town and
suddenly calls off her engagement and decides to come out. Missy has
to deal with her junky mom and raising her sister and ends up getting
knocked up by Nasreen's half brother. Emma the English teacher
continues her affair with a married man. Mandy the school principal
manages to piss off both students and teachers with her new school
policies, but luckily she seems more like a saint when compared to
the new deputy assistant principal. Meanwhile the school's biggest
trouble makers are Jordan, is the future gangster wannabe/drug dealer
and his brother Cory is the school male gigolo, both of them are
dealing with their abusive father, unfortunately not very positively.
This
series was like a never ending school drama, school is tough enough
with all the studying, bullies, and dealing with parents and
teachers, but then imagine a school where half the school thinks they
are better than the other half treating them like terrorists and the
other half hates them for stereotyping them, the school seems
constantly on the verge of a racist war. The series also deals with
modern issues such as high school drop outs, parenting, teen
pregnancy, drugs, sex and other social dramas. From time to time
characters breaks the 4th wall and address the audience directly or
plays a narrator giving more insight to the characters and story.
There
are no extras.
The
last two releases are police procedurals. First we have Sara
Stein - From Berlin to Tel Aviv: The Complete Series
(2019) and the reason for the long title is that this is actually the
second series of cases by the Israeli detective played by Katharina
Lorenz, who did a set of her first cases back in 2016 that we'll have
to catch up to later. Politically charged and a nice change of pace
location wise, we get four telefilms in which she must solve the
murders of a DJ, inspector, archeologist and a human rights activist.
Though
we get nothing too original here, these are not bad mysteries, but
they were only so good, as the teleplays invite us to get more
emotionally involved due to the politics or situations that you
usually don't see in the U.S. equivalent much. The locations are a
plus and Lorenz is good in the role, able to carry the show well, but
the overall result is mixed in each TV movie and I wanted it to go
even further, but it plays it a bit safe in certain ways per the
subgenre. Still, those who want something more out of such
television will want to try this one out themselves to see if they
like it as much or more. It is at least not boring.
No
extras.
Finally
we have a show we looked at the early seasons of years ago, Trial
& Retribution: The Complete Collection
(1997 - 2008) which is a very successful police procedural created by
no less than Lynda La Plante (Prime
Suspect,
Widows)
and here's what we said about the first few seasons...
One
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/7555/Trial+&+Retribution+%E2%80%93+Set+1+(Acorn+
Two
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/8255/Trial+&+Retribution+%E2%80%93+Set+2+(Acorn+
Three
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/9462/Trial+&+Retribution+%E2%80%93+Set+Three+(Ac
Four
http://www.fulvuedrive-in.com/review/10204/Trial+&+Retribution+%E2%80%93+Set+4+(Acorn
The
best way to describe the show is if something as flat as Law &
Order played like Barry Levinson's Homicide series, with
some of that intensity. The last eight cases are the ones we never
got to cover and they are in line with the rest of the series, which
goes form having good shows to ones that do not necessarily work.
The style of cutting the screen up into smaller images became a
hallmark of the show it retained to the end. They found more cases
to bring to life with some good actors and situations, then quit
while they were ahead. Now you can see with the entire set of shows
in one place for the first time. Not bad, if not classic.
Extras
include a behind-the-scenes documentary with cast and crew interviews
(46 min.); interviews with Lynda La Plante, David Hayman, Victoria
Smurfit and Colin Salmon (41 min.); Set 6 behind-the-scenes footage
(32 min.) and a few other bits.
The
1.33 X 1 image transfer on the first Trial can show the age of the
analog video, but the show still has aliasing errors and other image
flaws when it goes widescreen, here in anamorphically
enhanced 1.78 X 1 framing. There is also noise up to the last shows,
so looks like the whole series was standard definition and could use
some work, especially if they consider upscaling the entire series
for Blu-ray like BBC just did for some of the Tom Baker Doctor
Who seasons.
The
anamorphically enhanced 1.78 X 1 image on Ackley looks best,
as good as it can in the DVD format, while the anamorphically
enhanced 1.78 X 1 on Sara Stein may be a newer production, but
it also is somehow softer than it should be beyond any styling with
some aliasing errors and limits a new show should not have.
All
three shows shockingly only offer lossy Dolby Digital 2.0 Stereo that
lack any kind of surround activity, are on the weak side and
disappoint, with some dialogue even difficult to make out. Why none
of these are 5.1 is a big mystery we'll never solve, but they are all
on the flat side, so be careful of volume switching and high playback
levels.
-
Nicholas Sheffo and Ricky Chiang (Bridge)