Director:
Julian Jarrold (1974)
James Marsh (1980)
Anand Tucker (1983)
Country: UK
Year: 2009
…
RED RIDING: IN THE YEAR OF OUR LORD is a trilogy of made-for-tv films that were later on released for theatrical release in the US and other countries. The trilogy is based on the “Red Riding Quartet” which is a set of four novels written by David Peace that have the same name but each has a different year in its title referring to year where the events of story take place. The quartet comprises the novels 1974, 1977, 1980 and 1983.
The trilogy is an adaptation of three of those four novels (1974, 1980 and 1983), but they are produced in a way such that if you watch all three of them then you won’t miss anything important from the second novel (1977) as main events from that novel are incorporate into the other films. The story of the trilogy is built on a backdrop of the real serial killing cases including the Yorkshire ripper case. The trilogy deals with many connected stories and flashbacks involving corruption, murder and mystery.
It is difficult consider each film separately as they are connected in terms of the backdrop story, but separate in their own individual events. Many recurring characters appear in the trilogy either in the events of the film or as a flashback. Many questions remain unanswered and mysteries unclear until you watch the whole trilogy.
The films are a little bit difficult to follow and understand things 100% if one does not provide his full attention to the story and the events as it includes a lot of characters. In addition to that, the Yorkshire English accent isn’t easy to follow at first. At the end, the whole trilogy is nothing short of brilliant and a true masterpiece in my opinion.
