The Hour Blu-ray Review
When Worlds Collide
Reviewed by Michael Reuben, December 31, 2012
Screenwriter Abi Morgan's best-known works in America are probably
The Iron Lady (2011),
which won Meryl Streep her third Oscar, and
Shame
(2011), a searing film portrayal of sex addiction that was more talked about than seen. In her native Britain, however, Morgan's most
successful creation is a series for the BBC called
The Hour, whose initial season was so
popular that another was ordered as soon as it had concluded on August 23, 2011. That second
season has just concluded on both the BBC and BBC America.
The Hour is set in the 1950s. At its most literal level, it's about the creation of what was then an
entirely new form of television: a weekly "news magazine" devoted to in-depth reporting on
major stories. The notion of investigative journalism delivered by TV "news readers" is common
enough today, but at the dawn of television, it raised both eyebrows and hackles. Especially in a
country that did not have the explicit command of the First Amendment, news outlets on a
network that was government funded, as the BBC was and remains, were expected to stick to the
government view of the facts and otherwise shut up. The decision to push further, to challenge
the government orthodoxy, caused collisions not only between the BBC and the government, but
also between factions within the BBC.
Morgan is far too effective an entertainer to rest everything on this historical clash of ideas.
Around this piece of journalistic history, she also wove a Cold War espionage tale as shadowy as
anything that John le Carré might have conceived (although Morgan's characters prefer the more
glamorous world of James Bond). She placed her story at a pivotal moment in British history: the
Suez Crisis that began in July 1956, when Egypt nationalized the Suez Canal. Thereafter, Israel
invaded Egypt, and an Anglo-French force bombed Cairo. The ultimate resolution, while not
especially successful for Egypt, validated its role as a player in international affairs and
confirmed Britain's decline as an imperial power. This sense of the old order crumbling but
scrambling desperately to shore up its foundations is everywhere in
The Hour, and not just in the
stories being related by the eager young reporters experimenting with a new programming
format.
Above all, Morgan created intriguing characters with backstories worth learning as they are
gradually revealed. I suspect that, if one were to check Morgan's personal video library, there
would be copies of
Broadcast News in multiple
formats. The complex personal and professional
triangle at the heart of
The Hour owes much to James L. Brooks's 1987 classic, but Morgan has
given it such a distinctly British character (and Fifties flavor) that the resemblance may not be
immediately obvious.
The trio at the center of
The Hour is a pair of ambitious reporters, best friends Freddie Lyon (Ben
Whishaw, most recently seen as Q in
Skyfall) and Bel Rowley (Romola Garai, the "middle"
version of the writer Briony Tallis in
Atonement), and a suave anchorman, Hector Madden
(Dominic West,
The Wire's McNulty). Freddie and Bel are tapped by their BBC mentor,
Clarence Fendley (Anton Lesser), to help him create a new kind of weekly news program to be
called "The Hour". It's an opportunity for both of them to get out of what they consider a dead-end job cutting newsreels, but Freddie's enthusiasm is
dampened when he discovers that Bel has
been promoted to producer. He and Bel are friends, but they're also rivals.
Freddie's ego takes another blow, when his bid to become the on-air face of "The Hour" is
rejected in favor of Hector Madden's handsome features and reassuring delivery. Hector's very
presence brings out both the best and the worst in Freddie, who fought his way to his present
position on hard work and intelligence, whereas Hector got there on charm, good looks and
knowing the right people. Tensions ratchet higher when Bel, with whom Freddie is openly in
love, begins casting sidelong glances in Hector's direction. Hector is married to a wealthy society
woman named Marnie (the luminous Oona Chaplin, daughter of Geraldine and granddaughter of
Charlie). But Marnie lives in the country, and Hector stays in town"for work"and he has a
wandering eye.
These rivals and colleagues are joined by Lix Storm (Anna Chancellor), a former war
photographer turned correspondent. As much a rarity as Bel in the boys' club of Fifties British
journalism, Lix also provides a striking contrast. Bel may be a committed career woman, but
both her attire and her deportment convey that she hasn't yet fully surrendered hope of the more
conventional possibilities in a woman's life. Lix closed those doors long ago. Her life is her
work, and her solace is a stiff belt of booze. At various points during the six episodes of
The
Hour, you can spot Bel alternately looking to Lix for guidance and eyeing her in alarm, as if Lix
were a portent of Bel's future life, if Bel continues on her current path.
An additional member of the reporting staff is a mysteriously quiet fellow named Thomas Kish
(Burn Gorman, formerly of
Torchwood), whose remarkably fluency in Arabic comes in handy
once the Suez Crisis kicks into high gear. In fact, Mr. Kish has a covert life of which the
audience knows much more than the staff at the BBC, but Freddie Lyons gradually uncovers it.
Freddie stumbles across Kish's secrets while pursuing an investigation that, at least initially, he
believes is unrelated to his work at "The Hour". In the opening episode, he attends an
engagement party, where the bride-to-be is a former acquaintance he hasn't seen for years, Ruth
Elms (Vanessa Kirby), daughter of Lord and Lady Elms (Tim Pigott-Smith and Juliet Stevenson,
both of whom are extraordinary in their few scenes). When Ruth recognizes Freddie, she
whispers to him that she needs help. Several days later, she's found dead, an apparent suicide,
but Freddie knows otherwise, and every lead he follows confirms his suspicions. But his
inquiries quickly lead him into a murky world of unidentifiable codes and secret messages, where
no one is who they seem, and loyalties are unclear.
It all may, or may not, have something to do with the situation rapidly unfolding in the Middle
East. Rumors that the Soviet Union is backing Egypt have been circulating for weeks, and now
there are rumors of a Soviet mole at the BBC. A government liaison named McCain (Julian
Rhind-Tutt) becomes a frequent and unwelcome visitor to "The Hour", and he seems to have a
special interest in Freddie and his activities. Freddie realizes that he's being followed, and he's
not sure who it is: Soviet agents, the British secret service who suspect
him of being a Soviet
agent, or some unidentified third party. The spy game has suddenly become much less fun than
when he and Bel are playing school charades where he calls her "Moneypenny" and she calls
him "James".
The Hour starts slowly, taking the time to identify individual characters and their situations and
move them into place. As the various subplots overlap and intertwine more tightly in tune with
the increasingly critical situation both in the Middle East and on the home front (where the
government's aggressive policy provokes significant protest),
The Hour gathers momentum and
picks up its rhythms. Even the interpersonal subplots seem more fraught and consequential, as
often happens in life when significant events are occurring all around. By the final hour, the
entire enterprise is hurtling toward its destination like a locomotive at full throttleeven the
editing rhythms speed upand there's an almost breathless anticipation to the whole affair.
Whishaw proves yet again that he's one of the most intriguing actors of his generation. Even
when doing nothing (which isn't often), his Freddie is a bundle of nervous energy: always
pushing, always probing, always looking for something, in the end always trying to prove himself
worthier than his humble beginningsand heedless of the consequences. (Freddie makes the
common mistake of thinking that truth is its own reward.) West very smartly plays Hector by
doing the opposite: relaxing, doing
less, adopting the demeanor of a man who has always felt
comfortable in his own skin and surroundings and doesn't feel he has anything to prove. Indeed,
the only person who discomfits him at all is Freddie. ("How do you
do it?" Hector asks him, in
an uncharacteristic moment, when he actually has to
prepare for an interview. "How do you know exactly the right question to ask?")
In her portrayal of Bel, the woman who loves both men in her own way, Garai walks a fine line.
Bel is capable of genuine intimacy with both Freddie and Hector, but she can also turn in an
instant and push each one away. In Bel, Morgan has written and Garai performs a portrait of a
contemporary woman struggling to invent an identity as she goes along. Once you've met her
mother (Hetty Baynes), you can understand why.
The Hour Blu-ray, Video Quality
Season One of
The Hour was shot by Chris Seager, the same cinematographer who shot the
Fifties period drama
Call the Midwife, which was also a BBC production. According to IMDb,
Seager used the same Arriflex D-21 digital camera for
The Hour, which would make sense, since
most BBC productions are now digitally acquired. A comparison between the imagery of the two
productions is instructive, because it shows how a cinematographer adapts his lighting to the
needs of the story. Where
Call the Midwife had the faded look of memories and scrapbooks,
The
Hour presents a bright and vivid image, even when dealing with matters shrouded in mystery.
The goal is to make the viewer feel part of what is happening
now, no doubt aping what a show
like
The Hour tried to do in an era when seeing TV in the home was still a novel experience.
As with other digitally originated material, BBC has encoded
The Hour for Blu-ray at 1080i, but
the interlaced format is not apparent to the eye until one freeze-frames. In motion, the interlacing
is not evident and does not generate visible artifacts. The image on these AVC-encoded Blu-rays
is sharply detailed, revealing all of the fine patterns in the impeccably chosen wardrobe
(discussed in detail in the extras) and the elaborate decor of locations like the Sherwin household
and the Elms estate. Blacks are deep, which is essential for scenes involving multiple tuxedos,
and contrast isn't overstated, which is especially important on the set for "The Hour", which
involves a lot of light gray backgrounds. The color palette doesn't seem to be "muted" so much
as limited, because the production design has been carefully controlled to limit the number of
colors in a scene as much as possible. Consistent with the era in television, this is a simple, less
colorful world. What colors there are, though, are sufficiently saturated to make an impression.
