Avis des critiques

All crime drama participates in crassness, and, as crass as it may sound, the murder mystery at the core of this miniseries, a character study that is trying its hardest to be “Top of the Lake,” is the least interesting element of the show, which is entertaining despite its banal plot.

It’s especially surprising to watch Winslet, with her history of inhabiting rosy ingenues, disappear into the colorless drudge of Mare, with the character’s six-inch dark roots and clumsy physicality. Never has the actor minimized herself in a role quite like this.

"Mare of Easttown" attempts to update this blueprint for 2021, with mixed success; its portrayal of the opioid crisis is nuanced and humane, but in light of the past year, some of Mare’s ill-advised abuses of power aren’t as easy to forgive as the show seems to think they are. In its rock-solid sense of place, though, "Mare of Easttown" sticks to at least one infallible rule: Inglesby is clearly writing what he knows.

"Mare of Easttown" is much easier to watch than "I Know This Much Is True," Mark Ruffalo’s joyless HBO miniseries from last year, and much of that is down to its star. Mare’s undimmable despite the encompassing gloom. Thanks to her, Easttown feels surprisingly warm for a town full of dead teenagers.

As the twists and turns of the cases are revealed, it becomes a show greater than the sum of its already considerable parts... Everything and everyone is real and you care about every tiny part. Wonderful.

A muddle elevated by superb performances... The characters are the reason to stick with this show as opposed to the murder and missing persons cases, starting with Winslet's performance. She gives Mare the spirit of a woman who spent years waking up swinging with all she's got and doesn't have time to grieve even though her life has given her many reasons to crumble.

Our compulsive desire for answers is what can keep us watching even a bad mystery, but in a really good mystery, the journey is what matters, the scenery, the people you meet: the detective, the bystanders, the suspects, all but one or two of whom will turn out not to be the killer. And “Mare of Easttown” makes those other minutes feel well spent.

A few melodramatic moments disrupt the naturalism midway through the season... But Ingelsby nonetheless conveys the texture of life in a specific depressed rural community without descending into the misery porn of, say, "Hillbilly Elegy."

“Mare of Easttown” holds our interest throughout, thanks to showrunner/writer Brad Inglesby, the brilliant ensemble cast led by Winslet in one of the most resonant performances of her career — and also to the locale itself... even in this age of CGI trickery and this city filling in for that city, there’s something almost tangible about real-world, real-deal locations.

I was reminded of the under-recognized "Unbelievable," and the moving novel "Disappearing Earth" by Julia Phillips. Winslet is offering a way to regain agency in the face of the world’s devastation; she’s selling it, and I’m buying it all.

The first true must-see drama of 2021, an excellent ensemble piece that works as character study, murder mystery, and actor’s showcase... This is going to be what everyone is talking about for the next two months and really through the next awards season, where it will be a deserving major player.

It’s nice that HBO has turned out another handsomely produced, manifestly serious mini-series for the wonderful actress Kate Winslet. It would be nicer if those series were worth her time and talent... Some style in the direction or honest feeling in the screenplay could have mitigated the dreariness, but “Mare” doesn’t offer much beyond Ben Richardson’s burnished cinematography.