State of Happiness BBC Four★★★★☆
Van der ValkITV★★★☆☆
My list for a good time emphatically would not contain any of the following: oil rigs, fish factories, no pubs and a Norwegian winter. State of Happiness majored heavily in all of these, and sometimes it was all quite, well, heavy. However, it is also set in 1969, which meant that we got the antidote of Mad Men-type fashion, period hairstyles, lovely old cars and drinking in work meetings (those were the days) as we prepare to see Stavanger amid the oil boom of the 1970s.
The producers have apparently denied that this is “Norway’s Mad Men”. Fine, but I was sure I could detect shades of depressed, neurotic, super-smoker Betty Draper in wealthy Ingrid Nyman (Pia Tjelta), who took to her bed necking Valium and weeping when she heard that her husband’s fish business was in trouble. “It feels like cancer!” she wailed.
I also whiffed lighter shades of Peggy Olson in poor Toril (Malene Wadel), knocked up at age 17 by a heartless American suit, and who was then forced into a reputation-saving loveless marriage to a creepy older man by her God-fearing mother. The scene in which he gruntily attempted sex with her soon after she had given birth was enough to make the stomach heave and explained why she had prayed he would be drowned at sea.
I suppose if we are flogging the comparison still further, Don Draper would be handsome
American Jonathan Kay (Bart Edwards), sent by his US bosses to close the operation down, but who then helps to find a massive oil reservoir. He needs to drink and smoke a lot more to earn that mantle, though.
Anyway, this series has a hypnotic charm and easily stands on its own merit; I actually loved its show-not-tell style of storytelling, such as when Toril’s father died and the scene in which we learnt Anna’s humble sheep-farmer family don’t want her to marry into Christian’s rich one. Little spoken, much said. Sometimes the oddest recipe can turn out tastier than it looks on paper.
I always suspect that a drama lacks confidence in itself when it resorts to a gratuitous rape or murder scene. Van der Valk, which got off to a good start last week, slipped down several rungs when it opened with the creepily elongated killing of a young woman on a hotel bed in her underwear, a victim who remained “sexy-looking” even while being stabbed and throttled. Yes, being in your death throes is never an excuse not to be “hot”, ladies.
It then took us on a labyrinthine journey involving religious erotica, identical twins, a frisky nun and the fetishising of Christ’s wounds, which did not bear much scrutiny. However, I could watch Marc Warren all day and I just think he works as Van der Valk Mark II.
I can’t say I am particularly interested in many of the other characters, although Job Cloovers (Elliot Barnes-Worrell) as the swotty genius to Van der Valk’s moody pool player is growing on me. The acting is mostly very good, it is just the plot that was ludicrous, ending in the well-worn rooftop scene, which Warren saved from being totally clichéd with sarcastic wit. It would struggle without him.