The Luminaries review, Culture Whisper
Gold is making a comeback on screen. Last week, Spike Lee released his Netflix movie Da 5 Bloods, about African-American veterans searching for gold in the jungles of Vietnam. This week, it’s the BBC’s turn with their six-part adaptation of The Luminaries, a period detective drama set in New Zealand during the Gold Rush.
But whereas Lee bathes his fiction in uncomfortable facts, writer Eleanor Catton (adapting her own book) and director Claire McCarthy (Ophelia) plunge into frustrating superstition with uncomfortable severity.
The Luminaries pulses with astrological influence. The characters are pushed by shapely constellations and planetary orbits, which only feel intrusive to an already interesting premise. But the mysticism, ultimately, doesn’t bring this series down – the big issue is: it’s galactically confusing.
