Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Review Tuesday: 'East West 101' - Series 1

Today’s ‘Review Tuesday’. Ten days ago darling Kate and Brendon loaned Sweetheart Vivienne and me Series 1 of the Australian TV drama East West 101 [1, 2, 3]. It comprises three DVDs with two episodes on each, plus an audio CD with a 10-minute sample of the soundtrack music. The box cover summarises the storyline in six words: ‘Two Cops. Two Cultures. One objective’. Both the cops work in the NSW Police Force’s Major Crime Squad. One is Detective Zane Malik – a Muslim family man and one-time child crime victim. The other is Senior Detective Ray Crowley – an Aussie loner who seemingly is not the biggest fan of Malik in particular and Muslims in general. The two men fight crimes and, sometimes literally, each other. Set in Sydney’s seedy side, each episode has the Squad working on a new murder simultaneously with some themes which flow through all six episodes [4]. And it culminates in an ending I wouldn’t have predicted in my wildest dreams. I couldn’t fault the acting (especially by Don Hany [5] as Malik and William McInnes [6] as Crowley), the stories (intriguing), the writing (credible), the cinematography (gritty) and the pace (frenetic). Given all this, the tension between the two detectives (personal and religio-cultural) and the music (Eastern, rhythmic, insistent) [7], I highly recommend East West 101. Series 2 is out on DVD [8]. Hint, hint, darling Kate and Brendon.

P.S. Season 3’s in production [9].

1 comment:

Kate said...

So pleased you enjoyed it as much as we did.
Still waiting to hear if you'll ever look at coppers the same way again. Dogs?