Zen (TV series)

Zen (2011) Based on a crime series by Michael Dibden. We saw Cabal and Ratking. In both, corruption at all levels of Italian society interfere with Zen’s quest for the truth and his goal of achieving some kind of justice. Complicated twists, multiple layers of knowledge and ignorance, double crosses, and intersecting motives: That’s about all there is to say about this series plotwise.
     The character is well done in the current fashion of the enigmatic wounded knight in thrall to various belles dames sans merci, wandering through the murk of evil. The movie making is in the same style, with jump cuts, multiple plot threads, brief glimpses of crucial but unexplained figures in the background, scraps of backstory, cool cars and great clothes, clever (and almost always apt) use of contrasts between dark and light, elegant and grungy locations, deliberate lack of transition shots, and minimal use of music. The tone is also in the current fashion, world weary and elegiac. The titles look like animated pages from Wired, now much imitated by the fashion magazines. All in all, well done entertainment. I’m sorry we missed the first episode. I’ll read one of Dibden’s books, if it happens to cross my path. **-½