TV

Netflix’s Brand New Crime Drama Series’ Most Mysterious Part Is Easily Explained

Netflix’s Brand New Crime Drama Series’ Most Mysterious Part Is Easily Explained
Image credit: Netflix, Paramount Pictures

The brand new show starring Andrew Scott gives Hitchcock-ish vibes for a particular reason.

Summary:

  • Andrew Scott has risen to wild prominence thanks to his truly villainous Jim Moriarty in BBC’s Sherlock, but his brand new role is even more intimidating because of one particular filming detail.
  • As the creators of Ripley, Netflix ’s new series, revealed, the specific feature that is constantly present in the show made a huge contribution into Ripley’s sinister aesthetics.
  • The brand new series also reveals a striking difference from the 1999’s famous film based on the same novel.

Andrew Scott isn’t new to the world of the cinema’s most profound villains — starting from his thrilling role of Jim Moriarty in the BBC series Sherlock back in the 2010s, the actor cemented his vile mastery in Netflix’s noir show Ripley.

Now that the series has been out for a while, many viewers were left bewildered by Ripley’s particular cinematic style — but it, in fact, makes a lot of sense when it comes to the show’s original source.

Based on Patricia Highsmith’s novel The Talented Mr. Ripley, Andrew Scott’s show isn’t the first adaptation of the famous criminal drama. Back in 1999, The Talented Mr. Ripley starring Matt Damon, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jude Law, Cate Blanchett and many others got released, but both adaptations have much more differences rather than similarities, if they can be compared at all.

Netflix’s Brand New Crime Drama Series’ Most Mysterious Part Is Easily Explained - image 1

The 1999’s film follows the same Tom Ripley who, lured by an offer of an influential businessman to spend some time in Italy in an attempt to talk the businessman’s son Dicky into coming back home to the US, embarks on a murder that allows him to try the victim’s personality on.

Despite the movie’s overall success, Steven Zaillian’s version doesn’t come close to it — and does quite the contrary by adding much more suspense.

Before starting the production, Zaillian and Scott came to an agreement that their series won’t be just an extended version of the 1999’s film but will rather stick to the original novel — and this is the reason why Ripley is all in black-and-white aesthetics.

While also being inspired by the 1940’s noir films, Zaillian brings in much more sinister and even unnerving visuals that form an intimidating duo with Ripley’s relentless, yet silent violence.