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‘Detectorists’ On BBC And Acorn TV Hope To Unearth A Fortune

17 Aug 2015

Source: NY Times.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/17/arts/television/review-detectorists-on-bbc-and-acorntv-hope-to-unearth-a-fortune.html

“Detectorists,” a 2014 BBC sitcom, is part of a long tradition of British comedies about daft eccentrics. But instead of going in the direction of noisy farce, it’s dreamy and steeped in melancholy, with a hint of the charm of the Ealing films and the great Scottish comedies of Bill Forsyth.

Across six episodes (all available online at Acorn.tv on Monday), two lonely, underachieving men — Andy (Mackenzie Crook) and Lance (Toby Jones) — try to strike it rich with their trusty metal detectors, which are practically extensions of their arms. What they turn up is soda can ring-pulls, Matchbox cars and grimy coins, used to buy pints at the pub.

But the many hours they spend creeping around the countryside, not to mention attending the meetings of the local metal detecting club (seven members strong), are mainly a distraction from lives of astonishingly quiet, and quietly hilarious, desperation.

“Detectorists” is the first series written and directed by the angular, wide-eyed Mr. Crook, who has appeared in the “Pirates of the Caribbean” movies and “Game of Thrones” and will always be fondly remembered for playing the raging toady Garth on the original “The Office.” “Detectorists” won the Bafta television award this year for best scripted comedy, and it’s a distinctive creation — not for everyone, but bound to be fiercely loved by those who fall into its rhythms.

Those rhythms are particularly slow — two episodes essentially build up to Lance and Andy’s brief, embarrassed performance of a single song at an open-mike night — and Mr. Crook’s comic writing is in the lowest of keys. His characters are vivid, though, from the laconic Andy and puffed-up Lance (Mr. Jones is marvelous in his first sitcom role) through the various batty members of the detecting club.

The show has a plot, involving rumors of a buried Saxon ship and a missing woman’s body, and both Andy and Lance have minor romantic imbroglios. But the heart of the show is their steadfast if pathetic friendship, and arguments like the one about the holy grail of metal detecting — a Saxon hoard?

The ark of the covenant? Or the Holy Grail?

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