Polar Park

Walter Presents is a curated collection of not-English-language television series, a mix of European police procedurals and thrillers and period costume dramas, that takes up a lot of real estate on the PBS Passport streaming service.  That’s where I found two favorites: Astrid and Munch—both set in Paris. Sometimes, though, I dip in and dip right out.  Glum Nordic detectives solving glum Nordic crimes in dim light while enduring alienation and dysfunction in their personal lives—not for me, except when the glum Nordic detective is played by Kenneth Branagh.

Recently, with a Major Sweater on my needles and trying to talk myself out of a third viewing of The American Revolution, I took a halfhearted roll through Walter Presents. I gave a chance to a 2022 French series called Polar Park, and guess what: it’s a winner!

Set in a frozen mountain town near Switzerland called Mouthe, Polar Park at first felt too fanciful. I like my cinéma more vérité, you know? The crime scenes left behind by a serial killer are elaborate tableaux of famous paintings, yeah right. And who just happens to be in town for this unlikely killing spree? A bestselling murder mystery writer, David Rousseau, who has made the long drive to Mouthe to see a monk about his mom, who died without mentioning to her son something that a son would want to know. So: plot and subplot are neatly set up, and off we go.

However improbable it all is, it works. It’s witty, well-plotted, and darkly comical, with a sprinkling of spine-chilling moments. Halfway through, there’s a revelation that makes you wonder how we are going to fill three more episodes, now that we know this thing. But the twists keep coming, and it holds together. There is violence, but it’s a bit like a hammy haunted house: it would be intolerable if we didn’t all tacitly agree that it’s totally made up for purposes of entertaining us, which it does.

David Rousseau is played by the dashingly downcast Jean-Paul Rouve, an actor and director who’d be a household name if our households were in France. Everyone involved in Polar Park is wonderful: actors, writers, set designers, costumers. The subtitles are great and didn’t distract me from my 3 x 3 ribbing.

Forget my bleating about Walter Presents, I hope there’s another Polar Park season coming!

Postscript. Talk about burying the lede! Polar Park has a ton of great handknits, not surprising given the snowy setting, but delightful nonetheless. The pièce de résistance is a charming patchwork blanket shown above, but there are also sweaters, hats, scarves, and mitts galore, all bona fide handknits. You may even be able to identify patterns; clearly someone on the Polar Park production team is a knitter.

Polar Park is in French with English subtitles.