If TF1 produces more and more of its own series, the channel nevertheless continues to buy them from abroad. However, she would have been better off without “Nightsleeper”, a railway thriller with exaggerated pretensions…
By LV
PourCiné-Télé-Revue
Who wants to be “24 hours flat”? This is what we should perhaps have reminded the makers of “ Nightsleeper », who sold their series as a breathtaking race against time that would make Jack Bauer pale. Not so fast…
The story begins with a theft on a station platform. After the frantic hunt for the suspect, the doors of the night train linking Glasgow to London close, and everyone goes about their business… until the discovery, in the conductor’s cabin, of a mysterious device which resembles to a bomb, but which in reality turns out – we will soon learn – a hacking system rendering the vehicle, and a priori the entire railway network, out of control. On this uncertain journey, where all communications have been cut, a dubious former police officer takes matters in hand and contacts the national cybersecurity service directly, via a passenger’s satellite phone. Director Abby, leaving for her vacation, then turns around, forced to trust this stranger at the end of the phone to find a way to stop this famous train which is going at full speed, without a physical driver at the controls.
A pitch that resembles the first episode of “Bodyguard”, with Richard Madden, and stretches over six episodes like “Hijack”, the excellent Apple TV+ series with Idris Elba at the heart of a plane hijacking; and “The Guilty,” the Netflix film starring Jake Gyllenhaal as a tortured emergency call center cop. But the comparison ends there!
save-who-can
In the British press, a critic called the thriller “fantastically terrible”, with a “dismal storyline”. We have to say that after watching the first two episodes, it’s unfortunately pretty well summed up! Soft, poorly dialogued and poorly acted, the series serves, over the tedious long minutes that pass, increasingly ridiculous scenes, with reactions from the characters that are simply incredible! Example: as the threat of a terrorist attack becomes clearer and degenerates into a deadly hostage-taking, those who don’t know each other but who, despite themselves, are in the front row find nothing better to do… than sing Kate Nash on the phone! Normal.
Surrounded by characters, each more irritating than the last, who throw inconceivable tantrums and disobey the authorities even though they risk passing through them, Joe Cole (John Shelby in “Peaky Blinders”) also fails to convey a certain form of empathy which would allow us to experience a nightmarish situation in real time through him. With a blank stare, the actor who looks like Macaulay Culkin just never really looks worried! On the other side of the line, Alexandra Roach (“Killing Eve”) also struggles to instill any tension. Sorry, but his head of cybersecurity, summoned as a reduced team when the entire country should be on maximum alert, is absolutely not credible.
Among the distressing absurdities, the wide open door of the cabin where the virus device is located, left in view of all those who pass by, is another. And yet! Nick Leather, the series’ creator, says he submitted his story to a former government cyber expert specializing in critical infrastructure, a railroad designer, and an “ethical hacker.” benevolent who tracks down companies’ IT vulnerabilities. And everyone would have told him that his synopsis was possible! That’s already it, but frankly… they could have refrained.
“Nightsleeper” (series), Wednesday October 9, 9:10 p.m., TF1
