Red Riding Trilogy: 1980

Adapting David Pearce's noir quartet, directors Jarrold, Marsh, and Tucker create a triptych of evil illustrating the wickedness of man.

As one young schoolgirl disappears, another girl is found dead - swan wings sewn to her back and the word 4luv scratched onto her body. For a Yorkshire police department in decay, this is the starting-point of an investigation that will expose the rotting underbelly of their society. Each part told from a different perspective - a cocky young journalist in 1974, a senior copper from Manchester brought in to clear up corruption in 1980, a middle-aged solicitor in 1983 - the concept of man's evil is twisted inside out, presented alternately as systematic, mythical, and banal.

The burden of adaptation is split between Jarrold, Marsh and Tucker - each of whom brings their own sense of style to this piece of Yorkshire gothic. We are plunged from nicotine-stained interiors shot on 16mm straight into apocalyptic vistas shot on 35 mm. These switches in literary and visual register makes for a deeply unnerving look into the black heart of man.
LEE BLANCHARD

Cast
Sean BEAN, Rebecca HALL, Peter MULLAN, Paddy CONSIDINE, Andrew GARFIELD: Producer
Andrew Eaton: Script
Tony Grisoni, David Peace (novel): Cinematography
Rob Hardy, Igor Martinovic, David Higgs: Music
Adrian Johnston Dickon Hinchliffe Barrington Pheloung: Spoken language
English