1.6 DVD commentary

[lwhite53]

Info from 1.6 DVD commentary:

-Most scenes in this ep shot with new, smaller, hand-held professional camera, enabling shots where standard 16mm camera couldn't fit. Held at chest height to replicate looking through human eyes. Camera gives ep edgy look, nothing is totally still -- "twitchy" feeling.
-Strip scene with Tom and McCann in field -- real situation for meeting hostile contacts, gotten from CIA advisor.
-Story line inspired by newspaper piece re in Columbia, terrorist groups helping each other.
-Info about how to attack a power station gotten from an Irish radical website. Catch-22 situation -- attack had to be credible enough to be believable but if the set up was too credible it would give instructions on how to really do it.
-Tom/DG meeting during medical exam inspired by the Wizard of Oz -- the power behind the curtain.
-Tessa knows about Crombie killing before Harry tells them.
-Ep script written by Howard Brenton and Davis Wolstencroft -- not typical 3-act structure -- two stories going on simultaneously -- lots of false peaks in unusual places, timing wise, which edge toward real fear in story.
-Place in Scotland where MI5 send misbehaving officers to serve out their careers -- dubbed Narnia by David W.
-McCann -- scary but somehow likable, something quite genuine about him.
-Showdown between Tessa and Harry -- like a chess game between two titans. They barely blink throughout the exchange. When she accuses him of cowardice -- "the truth will out" -- her account is the truth!
-Every time your mobile goes dead for no apparent reason, MI5 is jamming the signals (don't ask me, that's what was said).

[Tea Lady]

Thanks for this. I mentioned the symmetry with the Wizard of Oz in the thread for 1.6. I did think it was a bit silly though and I didnt get get the point it was trying to make. Does the DG not really exist?? Odd.

[lwhite53]

I think it was just a little comic relief woven into a very tense situation. Yes, I did see your Wizard of Oz reference in the 1.6 discussion! I think the DG exists, just that he's above it all so the "power behind the curtain" is really only there to thwart Harry's wishes. I generally see the DG types as allied with the politicians, anyway, and not really part of the operational force of the service.