Liverpool Sound and Vision 7/10
Cast: Gemma Arterton. Aisling Franciosi, Nila Aalia, Patst Ferran, Rosie Cavaliero, Gianni Gonsalves, Soumil Malla, Alessandro Nirvola, Wayne Llewellyn, Dipika Kunwar, Chaneil Kular, Jim Broadbent, Diana Rigg, Aahish Shrestha, Gina McKee, Prabal Sonam Ghising, Komal Ghambole, Kulvinder Ghir, Charlie Maher, Karen Bryson, Lauren Okadigbo, Sabin Basnet.
“Under the watchful gaze of their God, secrets in isolation are revealed“, such is the reach and determination of religion, especially that of the Anglican Church during the first half of the 20th Century that the way it made its presence known in the sacred lands of the East and certainly those who lived in the shadow of the Himalayas, is one that arguably is to be seen in modern terms as furthering the cause of colonialism, of empire. However, instead of soldiers and guns, instead of war, there is rhetoric, there is dogma, and there is the fear of the intangible and invisible; only the word of a priest and a nun spreading the word to the so called uneducated.
Whilst Black Narcissus is perhaps to be viewed as a tale of the forbidden and the rise of sin, it is set against the idea of enveloping, of imposing a doctrine on those who cannot or will not bear the responsibility or the deference that others believe they need to show, and in this new adaption created for television, what the viewer is asked is perhaps where they stand on history, on the crimes committed in the name of the Father against the indigenous people.
The forbidden is always hidden in plain sight, and perhaps in a tale of secluded nuns and worship, plain sight is not enough to charge this gothic tale of anything more illicit than the peek behind the curtains, in fact the one moment in which seemed to be filled with more than the erotic lust was almost in its final frame, the reveal of the hidden name.
It is to that end that, and despite some good performances by Rosie Cavaliero and Aisling Franciosi in their respective roles as the loyal Sister Briony and the damaged Sister Ruth, that the three-part series falls flat against its black and white illustrious predecessor.
Black Narcissus has, like most religions, good intentions, but it fails to really land a punch of the shocking and revealing, relying instead on good will and a slight deference to belief. It is to guilt that in the end this particular version hangs itself upon, and guilt is always one that sells.
Ian D. Hall