TI go to Cabot Cove instead of the Lady in yellow, the 19th century crinolines instead of the 1980s shoulder pads. In keeping with the crime that’s fine, Lidia Poët’s law is the Italian contribution to the boom of investigators, commissioners, profilers. The inspiration of the series Netflix it is noble, the first lawyer in Italy and the first to be struck off the register three months after enrolment, in 1883 (“If God wanted you to be a lawyer, He didn’t make you a female”). Lidia will only return 30 years later, at 64, but having put her studies to good use with public contributions and working alongside his brother Enrico, a regular lawyer.
On this synthetic plant of offended womanhowever determined to work, produce, obtain results (today we say «to become herself»), the Greenland Production by Matteo Rovere (also director together with Letizia Lamartire) has built on Matilda DeAngelis the character of Lidia Poët/2. Heroine of her time but with contemporary ways of doing.
Namely dresses philologically flawless next to a spoken whose register moves between Small ancient world echo”; in which the reason for his expulsion is the original one of the Court of Cassation, as original they are the back and full front by Edoardo Scarpetta – Jacopo Barberisjournalist of the Piedmontese Gazette; in which the granddaughter Marianna (Sinéad Thornhill) is infatuated with the gardener like Gabrielle Solis of Wisteria Lane.
Lidia Poët’s lawsweet anachronistic tale
That means: agree the fact that Lidia contributed to the reform of prison law and to the women’s questionbut here we are not on Rai Storia with Paolo Mieli’s voice overwe are on the stream of Enola Holmes and of Wednesday emo teenager. Of the brood Bridgerton. Of the reassuring past of customs, new reservoir-Arcadia of seriality since fashion is only a reference to itself. And, therefore, in this Forum and the city – the series opens with her lover giving her a oral sex – the story is the same dazzling and adventurousfresh and fabulous, a half-dark half-pink Harmony flap.
Even if Lidia’s rent problems are real, unlike those of Carrie Bradshaw and her colleague Miranda (moreover still treated with condescension by the males of the following century).
Matilda De Angelis and Edoardo Scarpetta in “The law of Lidia Poët”. (Netflix)
Forum and the citybut always with some Sex
For success it is enough to dirty this Arcadia of irreverent anachronismoffshoot of the pop mix of Moulin Rouge finally became model in 2006 with Marie Antoinette by Sofia Coppola. To be clear: the All-Stars thrown in the middle of the satin slippers And classical music among The Cure. In Lidia Poët you hear so many strings and so much electronics, Two weeks Of FKA twigs And Misfits of RIIVAL, but no trace of sneakers in Piazza San Carlo.
However, the title of the series is Coppoliana rebellious art student brushstroke reminiscent calligraphic fetishism of the biopic’s opening credits, with the queen’s name encased in a punk rip as it plays Natural’s not in it of the Gang of Four. Criticism of the consumer society of 1979 applied to the luxury of Versailles. In Turin – in the city which at the end of the 19th century was in full political, spiritual and entrepreneurial turmoil – instead there is a woman of today born in the wrong time.
Who knows what the real Lidia would say about this feuilleton of which it was the trigger (she who was born there in the feuilleton boom and perhaps was used to easy entertainment literature). As for Jane Austen adapted in a horror sense Pride and Prejudice and Zombies from Seth Grahame-Smith, we will never know. It is true that, just thinking of them concentrated in a judgment, it is difficult to hypothesize bursts of enthusiasm.
The feuilleton is dead. Long live the feuilleton!
But, while the film based on Seth’s book in 2016 was a good disaster, in Lidia Poët’s law – 6 episodes – almost everything works. Removed the laughability of who did itof the crime on which each episode revolves and which is basically the least interesting part, it’s often the dialogues (together with the direction and scenography, of course) which in the series hold attention. Guido Iuculano, Davide Orsini, Elisa Dondi, Daniela Gambaro and Paolo Piccirillo have done an excellent job considering the non-literary starting point, especially in outlining the relationship between Lidia and her brother Enrico, a bourgeois who is all formalism (a remarkable Pier Luigi Pasino).
their bickering, horror at her sister’s affectionateness followed by pleasure at her disobedience to the rulesfrom which the victory of the case possibly derives, these are hilarious moments. Like those with Jacopoa journalist who exhibits family jewels on the first occasion – an Italian contribution to the trend of male genital exposure on TV, prosthetic or real. This Watson good as Jude Law in the movies of Sherlock Holmeshas a multiple role: Lydia’s helper, Lydia’s confidant, Lydia’s informant, and vice versa.
Edoardo Scarpetta, Matilda De Angelis and Pier Luigi Pasino. (Netflix)
The fact that you always go around the Poët house as brother of Henry’s wife (Teresa Berberis in PoëtSara Lazzaro), and therefore her brother-in-law, helps solidify a relationship full of sexual tension that was born out of a tribute to Gone With the Wind (the vase thrown by Rossella against the wall which wakes up Rhett lying on the sofa). “Will they end up in bed?” is the suspended question when they are in the same scene, “Will they break the bedsteads?” the next one.
More wickedness would have helped
Without ever being too angry and never too indulgent, Lidia observe Enrico, Teresa and all the other mice respecting the rules with the precision of a predator and the malice of a seductress. Her mind runs fast, she knows the progress of investigative science, solves, senses and protects every trickle of freedom, that of her niece in the grip of her parents and that of the convicted who she knows are innocent. She uses people to her advantage but appears naive in managing feelings.
Matilda, with his soft and, at times, almost inaudible voicegives her a warm and incorruptible personality. More nastiness and friction wouldn’t have hurt to this portrait of a woman deduced as if from too many skimmings. Characters live above all on eccentric details and little homogeneity, even decorative.
Nobody wanted a hagiography like the Waldensians present at the press conference of the series and so disappointed (Lidia was born into a family of the community of the Germanasca Valley), nor a product Ambient TV as Emily in Paris, to be streamed by doing other things. No. Maybe you just wanted something as memorable as the meme “Who’s dead?” by Jessica Fletcher. A second season could produce it; meanwhile, while we wait, we console ourselves with the still image of Scarpetta’s backside (the second one in a TV series, thank you very much).
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