Long on style, short on sense, these three made-for-TV crime dramas had a Twin Peaks flavor to them, with suspenseful music and an overriding sensation of never knowing exactly what was going on. Partly this was due to the Yorkshire accent, which begged for subtitling, but mostly it was due to the misdirection, which withheld key items of information and threw in red herrings instead. Who killed whom in the Karachi Club after Eddie Dunford took his revenge? Why? What happened to the shopping mall? What happened to the corrupt cops? To Helen Marshall? Why did she have a relationship with Rev. Laws? Why did Peter Hunter’s wife keep calling him? So many of the characters and situations seemed familiar from Prime Suspect and other shows of that ilk, most of which I preferred. It does seem that the scriptwriters in London have a pretty low opinion of what goes on out in the English boondocks. Red Riding (what does that mean?) did offer one novel twist: the three episodes had a common bad guy but a different hero, each of whom was suitably engaging.

No criticisms, but the movie seemed rather ho-hum and superficial in comparison with the book. It kept me engaged, but mostly to see how the next plot development would be handled – what would be skipped, what elided.

Extremely Hitchcockian music, by Alexandre Desplat, and the bleakly austere setting of “Martha’s Vineyard,” made one sense danger at every turn. Pierce Brosnan, Ewan MacGregor and especially Olivia Williams acted beautifully, and the pieces fit together like a Swiss watch. In short, this was a wonderfully made film. The only problem was the plot, which required one to accept that the CIA, without a recent success to its name, could engineer Britain’s entry into the Iraq War; and that the generally impotent (v. major powers) International Court of Justice could provoke a worldwide hue-and-cry over a Prime Minister’s “rendition” of four alleged terrorists, when the U.S. was doing worse on a weekly basis. Undoubtedly, this story would play better in Europe, where director Roman Polanski, for familiar reasons, is in exile.

A forgettable piffle, saved mainly by being a French piffle and the lovely Juliette Binoche. Saw it on the plane four days ago and have already forgotten what it was about.

Strangely unaffecting, in a Chekovian manner. Aristocrats stand around distraught, but we don’t care. About them, the Tolstoyan movement, or Tolstoy’s copyrights. The announced theme is Love, but there is no real chemistry between Helen Mirren and Christopher Plummer; and the younger couple, James McEvoy and the luscious Kerry Condon, exhibit more lust, or puppy love, than any serious model. Paul Giamatti is either miscast or unnecessarily sleazy – what’s his game?, you wonder. An empire of sorts is collapsing, but we don’t care.