The other Copenhagen
If the capital of Denmark is often praised for its quality of life and its tranquility, the Danish filmmaker behind Drive (2011), Nicolas Winding Refn, likes to make it the scene of dark events, especially in his new fiction series with the allure of a fantastic and poetic film noir. With Copenhagen Cowboythe public is indeed invited to follow Miu, played by Angela Bundalovic (The Rain), an enigmatic young woman in search of justice and revenge who evolves in the bowels of a confidential Copenhagen plagued by crime.
After dedicating her life to a mysterious organization, Miu wants to make amends. Or almost. As she embarks on a new path, she meets her lifelong rival, Rakel, played by Nicolas Winding Refn’s daughter, Lola Corfixen, with whom she once had a nebulous yet very complex relationship. Together, they discover that their future is intimately linked and embark on an odyssey that often borders on the supernatural…
Almost four years after its first American series, Too Old to Die YoungNicolas Winding Refn reconnects with his hometown, which he had left for the United Kingdom and Hollywood since Pusher 3. The Angel of Death in 2005. Copenhagen Cowboy is also a clever mix of what has made the director famous internationally: an ultra-slick neon-lit aesthetic, a soundtrack punctuated by electrifying techno and lots and lots of violence.
Copenhagen Cowboy
Netflix, from January 5
Elena Ferrante, an aunt and her niece
There was the series The prodigious friend by Saverio Costanzo in 2018, then the feature film by Maggie Gyllenhaal The Lost Daughter, end of 2021. There are now The lying life of adults (Tea Lying Life of Adults), a new adaptation of a work by Elena Ferrante, this time by Italian filmmaker Edoardo De Angelis (indivisible) for Netflix. As in the novel The vita bugiarda degli adulti, released in 2019, the series immerses viewers in the Naples of the 1990s, when the young and rebellious Giovanna (Giordana Marengo) navigates somehow in adolescence.
“If you want to become a woman, if you want to grow, you have to fall, you have to suffer,” her aunt Vittoria (Valeria Golino) told her one day, whom she knew little of and who, to the chagrin of her overprotective parents, makes him discover another facet of the Parthenopean city, more friendly and free than the beautiful neighborhoods where he grew up. Thanks to their clandestine escapades, Vittoria allows, among other things, her niece Giovanna to see more clearly about the lies and hypocrisies that dictate the life of her parents…
The lying life of adults
Netflix, from January 4
The stormy waters of the North Sea
Prime Video has trusted filmmaker David Macpherson by entrusting him with the writing of his fiction Tea Rig, a first for this one. Something unusual in the international consumer audiovisual landscape, the original series takes place on an oil platform off the coast of Scotland, in the spray of the North Sea. We meet the crew members of the Kishorn Bravo in an atmosphere of suspense, to say the least supernatural, as they were about to return to solid ground.
An earthquake and a major power outage upset their plans, however, and thick fog quickly envelops the platform. Cut off from the rest of the world, the crew, notably made up of actors Martin Compston (Line of Duty) and Owen Teale (Dream Horse), must face a mysterious force that pushes everyone out of their entrenchments and puts their sincerity, dedication and resistance to the test in a hostile and shattering environment.
The Rig
Prime Video, from January 6
The ice storm, 25 years later
Finally, two Quebec documentaries return to the ice storm that hit the province in January 1998. On January 4, TVA presents 35 days of darkness by Jean-François Poisson, a film that recounts the 35 long days when many citizens were deprived of electricity. Unpublished archive images and numerous testimonies, including those of Steve Flanagan, spokesperson for Hydro-Québec, and André Caillé, general manager of Hydro-Québec at the time, thus make it possible to trace the course of the events and to examine the damage caused by this unprecedented storm, but also to show the unconditional solidarity that Quebecers have shown.
Ice 98 is for its part a documentary of Historia where the host Étienne Boulay talks with those – soldiers, firefighters, farmers, etc. — who fought heart and soul during the ice storm to get Quebec back on its feet as quickly as possible, despite the extent of the damage.
35 days of darkness
TVA, January 4, 7:30 p.m.
Ice 98
Historia, January 7, 8 p.m.