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SPOTLESS

spotlessOne the things I absolutely love about today's entertainment landscape is the ability to see shows that we might never have seen given where they were made.

I've always embraced the shows that were coming across from other countries.  BBC America probably started it but Netflix really pushed this effort. This continues with "Spotless" a Franco-Brit combined production that deals with a quite unusual premise but the world set up here slants everything including normally familiar relationships and consequences of those relationships.

The Premise: Jean Bastier (Marc-André Grondin) who owns a business that cleans up crime scenes, gets involved with gangsters after his shady brother Martin (Denis Ménochet) comes back into his life, forcing Jean to use his cleaning skills to eliminate evidence of crimes.

It's hard to describe this show in some senses.  It's well written, acted and shot.  What also works all the time are the relationships which seem both mundane and profound. spotless

Jean is an obviously troubled man.  He has a great business, wonderful kids and wife (Miranda Raison) who is in all respects amazing.  Yet, he's having an affair with a younger woman (Tanya Fear) who never wants him to leave his wife.  This triangle is somewhat mundane except for the fact that Jean can never be honest with his wife in anything; he keeps everything from her and only confides in his mistress.  Okay, maybe that's not that starlilng but it is puzzling given how open and supportive his wife is. It makes you continually wonder why.  It's quite maddening at times.

spotless martin

Another example is the brother/brother relationship.  Jean and Martin couldn't be more different. Jean is quiet, refined, "respectable" at least on the surface.  Martin is sloppy, boorish and crude and a small time hustler.

And the bros don't really much like each other.  Their very troubled past is seemingly all that binds them; as if they feel an obligation to work together but with no real affinity for it.  And yet, they always seem to be there for one another while at the same time undermining each other likely because this deep secret is terrible and to share that with someone, even someone you don't feel close to, is some salve for a guilty conscience.

This is a dark comedy.  And it is funny, amusing and everything in-between.spotless

A scene in which Martin is due some punishment is so unique and funny - I've never seen anything quite like it before; it would perhaps remind you of the best of Guy Ritchie's gangster films.

Speaking of which, Brendan Coyle plays a great gangster who is forcing Jean to work for him cleaning up his dirty work.  This is the twist that makes things really interesting in this show.  What a genius idea.  A man whose business is working with the police to clean up crime scenes would know intimately what it takes to completely eliminate all forensic evidence of any crime.

Coyle plays the gangster with tired and worn familiarity.  He's seen it all, done it all in his climb to the top of the food chain.  He doesn't have to prove anything anyone anymore - he's the boss: end of story.  And he's equally at home blackmailing a cop or beating a snitch as he is growing organic vegetables.  When he's in the scene, you inadvertantly find your jaw clenching because the possible threat is always around him like a faint stink of decay.

Plus, Coyle's small coterie of henchmen are just fantastic.  None better than Liam Garrigan who plays Coyle's brother and does something so shocking in one ep that it took me a moment to registerspotless it.  This act leads to even more complications in Jean's life.

At the same time it is rife with comedic bits, Spotless is in your face ugly and brutal.  A moment where someone has to die because of a betrayal is just BLAM - he's dead.  It comes as a shock because of what comes before.  There's no sentimentality at all - it's a matter-of-fact business decision and he's dead.

I truly enjoyed this show and can't wait for it to return for a second season.

It's streaming on Netflix so resist the urge to binge it.  You'll want to savor every sweet and bitter drop.

 
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About the author

Mark Sevi

Mark Sevi

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Mark Sevi is a professional screenwriter (32 scripts sold, 19 movies produced) and scriptwriting teacher through Southern California community education.  He is also the founder of the OC Screenwriters Association.

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