Braquo - Season 3 - Acquired by new channels + episode titles + review of episodes 1 & 2
Feb 16, 2014
Canal Plus Movies Reviews— Two new broadcasters have acquired the rights of the third season of Braquo (I hope the first two seasons have aired in these countries before) : Rialto in New Zealand and Globosat in Brazil.
So you can look forward to seeing season 3 of Braquo on these channels sometime in 2014.
The Emmy-award winning drama (at the International Emmys in 2012) also streams on Hulu (US), and airs in the UK (on FX), Australia, Israel, Turkey, Vietnam, Russia, Croatia, Bulgaria, etc, for a total of more than 90 countries.
Source.
— The titles of all 8 episodes of season 3 are :
3.01 - Affliction.
3.02 - Nos funérailles (Our Funerals).
3.03 - Odessa.
3.04 - Stoukatch.
3.05 - Le lait et le miel (The Milk and the Honey).
3.06 - Prologue.
3.07 - Andreas.
3.08 - Entre la Terre et l'Enfer (Between Earth and Hell).
— Furthermore, Canal+ has put episode 3.01 on Youtube for the next two days (they uploaded it last Tuesday morning after the broadcast of episodes 3.01/3.02, but now there are only 48 hours left), I hope it's not region-blocked (then again, there are no subtitles) :
Episode 3.01 on Youtube
— REVIEW of episodes 3.01/3.02 - I try to be as evasive as possible, but there are a couple of mild spoilers.
I've seen episodes 3.01 and 3.02 and overall I am very pleased, as soon as I finished episode 3.01 (which flew by), I immediately watched the second one (the 53 minutes also flew by), and I am eager to see what comes next.
We pick up right where episode 2.08 left off, and that's an exciting starting point. There is a great balance between the two main arcs of the season : the vengeance on Vogel and the Russian/Georgian/Ukrainian/Armenian traffic / internal wars. When the action shifts to this latter part of the story, you think you'll be annoyed because the revenge stuff is more personnal and gripping while the Russian mobster subplot is disconnected… and it is, a little bit, but then it turns out that it's actually connected in some capacity.
The key character here is Lizzie Brocheré's character, Oriane, who much like Vogel wants to take Caplan down, and she is linked to one of the Russian mobsters. We'll probably find out why she wants to destroy Caplan's life (not just him, everyone around him) later on in the season, but I'm intrigued. I liked her very much in American Horror Story Asylum and she's great here too, and her duo with Vogel (who's usually a lone, crazy wolf) works well.
Btw, they manage to reuse a character seen in episodes 2.03 & 2.04 as part of that Eastern Europe mobster threat. It was already established he was shady (it's the guy Lemoine tried to kill with a machine gun in his café), but now we see him in action - good way to include a previously established minor character into a side of the story full of newcomers — who don't speak French between them, as a result about 4% of episode 3.01 and 7% of episode 3.02 is in Russian.
Speaking of firing a machine gun onto a café, season 2 was critized for its unplausability compared to the "realistic" style of season 1. Well, so far season 3 is in between, and I like it. There are a few things that are too easy (Oriane showing up at the appropriate moment on Vogel's doorstep, Roxane making her way through the hospital like she has done this 100 times) but so far there's no revolutionary riffle in sight.
Braquo never had the finest dialogue, it's always been a bit caricatural, with so many ways to say so many insults (just because the characters are tortured, dark and gritty doesn't mean they have to be rude potty mouths all the time)… well, it's still there, in typical Braquo style, and it kind of made me chuckle a couple of times.
My picks :
- "Put your cock away, I've seen it enough today." (Oriane talking about Vogel's knife).
- "Word of advice, Mrs 'I killed my daddy' : you try to fuck me, I won't hesitate to smoke you, and unlike your dad, there'll be foreplay, Vogel style." (Vogel taking to Oriane).
-"What? This asshole? This asshole is on the case? Fuck, he wouldn't be able to find his hand in his pocket, and he gets the case?!" (Roxane).
Long story short, I would give a solid B+ to both episodes, this is not a disappointing return at all, and I'm looking forward to tomorrow night's episodes.
— Also, I'm just coming back from the theaters where I saw a very good action movie called Mea Culpa.
If you like Braquo you'll love this film, they share a certain similarities : dark, gritty leather-wearing cops, full of action, Russian bad guys in this one too (I think that's the Olympics special). It's very well directed/edited, the cinematography is top notch (the story isn't overly complicated, but it's alright), it comes from Fred Cavayé, director of the excellent Pour Elle (Anything For Her, starring Vincent Lindon & Diane Kruger) and the excellent À bout portant (Point Blank, starring Gilles Lellouche, Roschdy Zem & Gérard Lanvin). Well, this is only Cavayé's third film but each one shows a real talent for delivering fast-paced drama and thrilling action :
It could be released abroad during the next few months - after all, Pour elle and À bout portant both had UK theatrical releases — Point Blank even had a US theatrical release ($750,000 grossed!) and Pour elle was remade as The Next Three Days by Paul Haggis with Russell Crowe & Elisabeth Banks.
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