A Netflix series about police interrogations, and a Japanese film by a little-known director

2 posts today, first, the British 3-part segment of the Netflix series, Criminal: United Kingdom; apparently this series is based on police interrogations of suspects, showing us how the team of police officers nail the cases, or don't, with some pretty lame attempts to build drama and relationships among the members of the team involved with the interrogation (usually 2 doing the interrogation and the other four in an observation room - though the team assembles during breaks and at the conclusion). The first 2 episodes were weak, in my opinion, in particular that it didn't seem that the interrogation drew out the key facts: In the first, the suspect pretty much incriminated himself after a long stretch of his saying nothing but "no comment"; in the second, it hardly took a genius to see the amateurish mistakes that the interrogator made. The 3rd episode was by far the best, as the team races the clock to get a truck driver, suspected for transporting immigrants into the country, to tell where he'd abandoned his truck and his human cargo, who may be freezing to death as the interrogation goes on. In part this episode is the strongest because there's so much ambiguity around the man under questioning, and also because there's a big surprise regarding one of the interrogators, prompted by an odd observation by the truck diver's attorney.

Second post follows on viewing of a 1937 Japanese film with the weird title of Humanity and Paper Balloons (don't ask), directed by Sadao Yamanaka; it was in fact his last film (he'd done many movies, mostly silent), as he died at age 28 in the war against Manchuria. It's by no means a great film (though at least one critic would disagree w/ that), but it does show the lost potential, who might well have risen along w/ his contemporaries Kurosawa and Uzo. This film is a little difficult to follow, especially at the outset, but centers on the lives of several characters in decrepit, crowded tenement in the Samurai era (18th or 19th century?). The main plot line follows a would-be Samurai who tries to get the support of a wealthy man for whom his father used to work but is continually rebuffed, driving him to drink; his best friend and immediate neighbor takes on the local criminal gang and tries to run how own gambling operation, with predictable results. The strength of the film is its depiction of horrible living conditions; it seems obvious that the powers that be would not allow a contemporary setting for this film - the misery and poverty had to be in the past, of course - but viewers today, and then no doubt, get the point.