Sunday, 15 March 2020 15:12

REVIEW: Hunters, Season 1 - Brilliant series with a hint of bitter taste. Featured

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Amazon has made a remarkable fiction series about Nazi hunters in New York with  Al Pacino in the main role. The series is brilliant and innovative. And a bit problematic.

Let's start with one of the obvious pleasures with this movie. For those of us who admire AL Pacino as one of the greatest actors of all time, this series is a must. Other than that, just for that reason, and it reinforces Pacino's importance that this is one of his best roles for a long tome time, at least if we skip the Irishman. Al Pacino is one of the very few actors who manage to change the character for every role he plays. Even in the Godfather triology, he had changed personality in each stage of life. Not many actors can do this.

In Hunters, he has a key role as an aging Jewish Nazi hunter, with German origins and time in Auswitch during World War II. Now the year is 1977, and he leads a limited group of underground Nazi hunters partially made up of Jews. Al Pacino plays very credibly in the role of an aging Jew with a base from Auswitch, and it is strengthened by an accomplished German accent.

One of the main features of the 10-episode series is that we get many parallel stories that are partially merged into one another. A young boy with a Jewish background, an FBI agent, an environment of full-time old Nazis, and Pacino's team with Nazi hunters. This approach is by no means innovative, but it has been carried out in a far above medium successful manner in Hunters.

Innovative and a bit controversial

More innovative, it is undeniable with the style mix that takes place in the series. And although the style mix is ​​obviously well thought out, the first two episodes can create doubt as to what the producer has wanted the series to be. Here, a classic drama atmosphere is mixed with more action-packed scenes, colorful musical time colors from the 70s, and highly parodic scenes from the Nazi environment. Not to mention the deeply bleak flashback scenes from Auswitch during the war.

And it is precisely this style mix that is innovative - not every style in itself, but the way they blend in this series. And it is also this mixture that allows one to have doubts about the legitimacy of the series. Then I think in particular about the combination of the gloomy flashbacks from the concentration camp in Auswich, and the chighly caricatured descriptions of the old Nazis in New York and Alamaba. The latter atmosphere almost belongs in a comedy series. There is also a degree of surrealism in some scenes. The "movie poster" also helps to give a strange image of the series, a picture of nonsense that the series does not deserve at all.

And so it has to be added that the misgivings with this mix gradually decrease throughout the series. Both because the shifts are quite strictly predictable, and because you get a little better insight into what this is about, not least in the series' surprising ending scene. And then it is tempting to suspect that these caricatures are so exaggerated precisely to distance viewers from the idea that this is documentary-based. It is not, even though physical encounters with a couple of "celebrities" from the real Nazi chases of the 70s appear.

Good actor performance

I have already mentioned that Al Pacino does a very good job in the series, and he is not alone to show off. The other lead role played by Logan Lerman also makes a solid figure, although he does not have the same span as Pacino. Lena Olin always plays well, while Saul Rabinek and Carol Kane are convincing in the role of an aging Jewish couple. Josh Radnor is not quite of the same caliber, and of course it doesn`t helps that the character he plays seems totally out of place, and contributes that the father-like character sometimes throws over in scenes involving the Nazi hunters.

The most important aspect of the series is in my eyes the drama element, and it is also in Meyer Offerman (Pacino) 's close relationships with some of the other characters that the series is at its best, whether they are of a confidential or more confrontational nature. But also as a thriller-series it is good. It's a good development throughout the series, and the ten episodes in just over an hour each never get tedious. It really culminates in the 10th episode, where we are also served a couple of big surprises.

The series is one of the highlights of the year so far, and good enough reason to subscribe to Amazon Prime for a period of time. Although it may not abound with so many other good reasons in the Prime selection. But who knows, maybe a season 2 of Hunters will show up. Everything should be prepared for that, even though the series in that case ……… .. oops, I can`t tell.

A solid five on the dice, on the edge to flip over to a six!

 

Read 3408 times Last modified on Saturday, 24 December 2022 13:59
Karl Erik Sylthe

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