I really wanted to like this more, but it's two quarts of plot in a five gallon pot.
I should say up front that the cinematography is gorgeous, the soundtrack and music are expertly done, it has all the current tropes of a streaming documentary (though perhaps a bit too much use of the interview gimmick where the subject stares silently into the camera as their voiceover plays on the soundtrack), and within the first fifteen minutes I wanted to visit Schull; after the first hour I wanted to live there.
That said, stretching this documentary out to about three hours of episodes seems more like a contract fulfillment than a need to tell a long story. There are very few cliffhangers; and while Episode 1 ends on a suitably Wow note, the story sort of bumbles along after that, mindful of the need to have long, gorgeous shots of scenery in between interviews so as to not reach present day too quickly.
While the case is practically entirely circumstantial, there is a lot of evidence implicating the chief suspect, with little to none pointing elsewhere and no other plausible suspects to talk about. Our suspect's chief defense seems to be simply saying that he didn't do it, over and over, and as we are now used to seeing how a trace of DNA can nail someone to the wall even decades after the crime occurred, the absence of much new insight into the case now makes one wonder why the film was made. As we moved through Episode 2, it seemed like Episode 3 was going to be the final, modern-day resolution at last. It wasn't.
I should say up front that the cinematography is gorgeous, the soundtrack and music are expertly done, it has all the current tropes of a streaming documentary (though perhaps a bit too much use of the interview gimmick where the subject stares silently into the camera as their voiceover plays on the soundtrack), and within the first fifteen minutes I wanted to visit Schull; after the first hour I wanted to live there.
That said, stretching this documentary out to about three hours of episodes seems more like a contract fulfillment than a need to tell a long story. There are very few cliffhangers; and while Episode 1 ends on a suitably Wow note, the story sort of bumbles along after that, mindful of the need to have long, gorgeous shots of scenery in between interviews so as to not reach present day too quickly.
While the case is practically entirely circumstantial, there is a lot of evidence implicating the chief suspect, with little to none pointing elsewhere and no other plausible suspects to talk about. Our suspect's chief defense seems to be simply saying that he didn't do it, over and over, and as we are now used to seeing how a trace of DNA can nail someone to the wall even decades after the crime occurred, the absence of much new insight into the case now makes one wonder why the film was made. As we moved through Episode 2, it seemed like Episode 3 was going to be the final, modern-day resolution at last. It wasn't.