Tuesday 30 December 2014

ORIGINAL VS REMAKE - Broadchurch/Gracepoint

Today ITV's Broadchurch does battle with FOX's Gracepoint.

Original

In 2013 a new series aired on ITV1 about the investigation of a boy's murder in a coastal town in England. I'd seen British crime dramas before, I'd seen  Sherlock and Death in Paradise and that sort of thing so I did actually give this one a miss; what did peak my interest though was the fact that on various websites and forums around the web people were raving about Broadchrurch, the whole of the UK seemed to be entranced with this show. A few months later I got round to watching it and boy, what had I been missing. Broadchurch is one of the most intriguing, emotional, fantastically realistic piece of television I have ever watched, it's plot and characters are so drawing I watched four episodes in one day. It is incredibly well directed, the shots and camera work is beautiful, the script is real, the acting is amazing from everyone. I don't know if it is because I have visited towns like these as I live in the UK (and have actually been to where it was filmed), but I can't get across how real it all felt. Whatever your taste in genre, you need to give Broadchurch a try.

Remake

When I heard there was going to be an American adaption I was disappointed because I am not in favour of films or television being remade for a foreign audience. But because it was the same writer and apparently it would end differently so I decided to check it out. Well, what can I say? Gracepoint is a shot for shot replica of Broadchurch, the scenes are exactly the same, the dialogue is verbatim to Broadchurch and there are very few creative differences. The problem is that it's just not as good, the acting is quite poor, David Tennant's terrible American accent is off-putting and for anyone who saw Broadchurch you could predict every plot point from the word go. I mean, to be fair they did add some new elements, mostly in episodes 4 and 7 and there was a new twist in the finale which were interesting but I'm afraid there was just not enough change for me. Even for new viewers the premise apparently it didn't go down well as the second season has been cancelled.

Comparison

As if I hadn't made it clear already Broadchurch is far superior so for this Original VS Remake, the original wins. Thank you for reading, if you disagree please leave a comment, after all these are just my opinions,


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