Cannes Confidential

The show had potential but suffers from a serious problem with the writing and acting. The dialog is wooden and doesn't ring true. The female lead detective isn't likeable or interesting. Rather than being irascible but somewhat charming she is just unpleasant. She is not a credible actor - or at least not in English. Often I could not understand her - shows like Death in Paradise have successfully integrated French speaking actors into the series by making sure they are understandable to an English speaking audience. Her female associate simply mumbles and is faced with trying to deliver cliche ridden lines. It is fortunate that we can't hear her most of the time.

I have only suffered through episode 1 - I am not sure that I can face Episode 2. The production values are excellent and of course the scenery is wonderful. It must have been expensive to film there. Too bad they didn't spend some of that money on writers and a decent co-star to match Jamie Bamber.

Overall, I have enjoyed this so far. There is a mix of murder mystery via police (and a questionable guy who seems to be good intentioned) and action, with a beautiful setting in Cannes.

The lead male character and actor is great, and some other characters and guest characters are fine, but unfortunately the lead woman detective character is overly serious and mean. Her dialogue and delivery is often fairly corny as well. Similar issue for her boss, who at least is on the screen far less.

Those behind the show likely wanted the detective to have a heavy French accent (when speaking English) to make it feel a bit more realistic as it's set in south France, but it still feels odd there is almost no French dialogue at all, including from that lead detective. I think adding some would benefit the show and I hope they can incorporate some in future episodes if the already completed episodes don't have any.

I'll continue watching and update my score and review at the end of the season.

Side note, the question below the user reviews asks, "Was this review helpful?" Not, "do you agree with the score they gave?" My score wasn't even that high, but since it's not below a 5 and mentions some positives, those who completely hate this show are using "No" like a downvote.

The good: Scenery is beautiful & I like the Harry King actor. At least he can act. The potential for good story lines is there but it keeps missing the mark.

The bad: Pretty much everything else...the dialogue, writing, editing, acting (especially the female leads), the same backstory has been way overdone & the filming & lighting were dark. Colours seem really off to me in some indoor scenes. Not in an artistic way. Makes me wonder if it was filmed on a phone. The very worst is the sound track that sounds like it's from the '80's and completely drowns out the dialogue, which is hard to make out anyway with the French accents but impossible with the music. We had to watch with subtitles. The worst episode is the 1st one.

I watched 4 episodes, so I gave this a real shot.

Let's start with the good. The show itself is a regular crime per episode with an underlying back story tying the main character into some larger mystery. The setting is beautiful, the people are beautiful.

Unfortunately, that's where the good ends. A sulky, work obsessed female lead broken down by a charming male counterpart is becoming a little overdone (and was.definitely done better in Mallorca Files), and this barely plays with the formula enough to set itself apart. The back-story itself is just too slow burning and the individual crimes of each episode just don't feel very well built.

I feel awful typing this, but I do feel that if the French actors were able to speak in their native tongue, their acting would feel far more convincing and their personalities would shine a little more. As it stands it feels forced in a lot of ways, and it's made worse with the contrast to Jamie Bamber's "upper-class" English accent. The chief of police I'm still not sure isn't dubbed even after watching so much.

Enough of that though. All around, I think it's watchable so I'm not going super low on the rating, but there are far better examples of the genre to go to before you get to this.

Alas, Cannes Confidential, besides its beautiful scenery, is a bust.

The women were cast too young and with ridiculous outfits.

The plot involving the father is confusing and doesn't seem necessary.

I only watched this show because of Jamie Bamber. This is so beneath him. First of all, for me to keep watching, he'd have to be in every scene and of course he isn't- he undoubtedly spends most of his time trying to line up another job or changing agents.

He's gorgeous, so with him and the scenery, it's not a total write-off.

I say cast some believable police detectives and feature Jamie in another series.