This juicy Nicole Kidman murder-mystery proves trash can be treasured
The Perfect Couple ★★★★
Netflix
This murder mystery ticks many prestige television boxes, starting with Nicole Kidman taking top billing, an esteemed supporting cast, and a twisty plot about a young woman developing doubts about the privileged American family she’s marrying into. But these six episodes beat with a trashy heart and The Perfect Couple delivers outrageous retorts and a wildly escalating plot with a knowing wink. Everyone involved is in on it, and the result is a succinct success – social commentary lags way behind sardonic revelations.
The setting is Summerland, the Nantucket summer home of the Winbury clan. Matriarch Greer Garrison Winbury (Kidman), is a successful crime novelist with a snooty mid-Atlantic accent, while her old money husband Tag (Liev Schreiber) is permanently stoned. The occasion is the wedding of their son, Benji (Billy Howle) to humble wage-earner Amelia Sacks (Eve Hewson). It’s all pastel summer suits, immaculate catering, and sly digs at the rehearsal dinner. Then a guest’s body washes up on the beach the next morning.
Sam Nivola and Nicole Kidman in The Perfect Couple.Credit: Liam Daniel/Netflix
Adapted by Jenna Lamia (Good Girls) from Elin Hilderbrand’s 2018 novel of the same name, The Perfect Couple has a tart energy and an understanding of how bitterness curdles. The extended Winbury clan love to dish – Benji’s older brother, Thomas (Jack Reynor) is a full-blown finance bro, while his pregnant wife, Abby (Dakota Fanning), smiles sweetly and drips acid. Isabelle Adjani turns up as Greer’s friend Isabel, who is extremely French – casual affairs, home truths delivered with a disdainful shrug, and a dislike of American wine.
What makes the show such an easy pleasure is that it leans into the chaos without ever toppling over. There’s a solid double act between the investigators – local sheriff Dan Carter (Michael Beach) and a hard-nosed Boston homicide detective, Nikki Henry (Donna Lynne Champlin) – that moves the procedural along with ease, while the story is grounded in Amelia’s realisation that marrying Benji brings some worrying baggage. One clue is Greer’s insistence that Amelia sign a non-disclosure agreement while she’s still in shock.
Jack Reynor as Thomas Winbury, Dakota Fanning as Abby Winbury in The Perfect Couple.Credit: Hilary Bronwyn Gayle/Netflix
The actors know how to deepen these florid dynamics. The more Kidman coolly tilts her head, the icier Greer’s judgement is. The story keeps offering up new revelations, and director Susanne Bier (The Night Manager) stays just on the right side of soap opera contrivance as the juicy flashbacks add up. A mystery man named Broderick Graham turns up seeking Greer; totally par for the course in this limited series. My recommendation is to embrace it all, particularly a fraught family and friends dinner that’s a rollercoaster of excruciating laughs. Bravo!
Revealed: Killjoy ★★★½
Stan
Kathryn Joy was three months old when their father shot their mother dead. Now they’re a 39-year-old researcher and advocate examining family violence and child bereavement. The journey between those two points is charted in this feature-length Australian documentary, which recounts the circumstances that led to Joy losing their mother, Carolyn Stuckey, and the painful journey towards discovery and then healing that ensued. The tone reflects the understanding gained: deeply felt, and intent on addressing the incomprehensible.
Kathryn Joy in Revealed - Killjoy.
Given the horrifying levels of domestic killings in Australia, the film provides both crucial personal detail and wider historical context. After Lismore pharmacist Allan Stuckey shot his wife three times in 1985, he received bail, retained custody of Joy and their two older brothers, and received a lesser sentence for manslaughter with a defence that Carolyn’s affair was provocation. Joy grew up in a home built on denial.
It’s understandable that director Vincent Lamberti’s narrative accelerates as Joy rebuilds their life in their 30s. The pain they carried was dragging them down, but now they have clarity and purposefulness. Nonetheless, the transformation’s arc is somewhat hurried and it doesn’t address questions such as Joy’s relationship with their siblings. But focusing on Joy’s path does allow Revealed: Killjoy to avoid a mistake too many documentaries make: emphasising the perpetrator over their victims. This is always Joy’s story.
Joaquin Phoenix in Ridley Scott’s Napoleon: now a suitably epic 205 minutes long.
Napoleon: Director’s Cut
Apple TV+
Hopefully more streaming platforms follow this path. If you make a blockbuster, as Ridley Scott did with last November’s saga about the French soldier and eventual ruler, don’t just give us the cinematic edition, upload the director’s cut. Adding 48 minutes of additional footage – the running time is now a suitably epic 205 minutes – to this biopic provides not just more of Scott’s thundering 19th-century battle scenes, but also greater clarity to the relationship between Napoleon (Joaquin Phoenix) and his wife, Josephine (Vanessa Kirby). This sprawling, occasionally ahistoric, drama needs all the nuance it can get.
Ticking along: Charles Edwards and Rebecca Gibney in Under the Vines, season 3.Credit: Jae Frew/AcornTV
Under the Vines (season 3)
AMC+
This New Zealand comic-drama about a Sydney socialite (Rebecca Gibney) and a disgraced London lawyer (Charles Edwards), who as step-cousins inherit both a rundown Kiwi vineyard and the chance at a new life, has been ticking along without issue. The third season is out now, and while there’s a fresh interloper disturbing the peace at Oakley Wines, the storytelling remains committed to small-town machinations, quirky locals, and Gibney nailing every fish-out-of-water scenario. Fans of To the Manor Born or Doc Martin will vibe with this.
Heartfelt dedication: Lesley Manville in Mum.Credit: BBC First
Mum (seasons 1-2)
Binge
Binge now has the first two of the three seasons produced for this first-rate British sitcom, which debuted in 2016 with Lesley Manville (Phantom Thread, The Crown) playing Cathy, a recently widowed mother trying to navigate the next stage of her life while dealing with the troublesome tug of family and friends. The storytelling is incremental and initially few edges are sharp, but over time it builds around the connection between Cathy and her lifelong friend, Peter Mullan’s Michael. The Scottish actor excels at menace, so it’s refreshing to see the heartfelt dedication he and Manville bring to their roles.
Follow the Rain
Netflix
Beginning with some remarkable time-lapse photography – a mix of otherworldly beauty and almost alien-like eruptions – this Australian nature documentary from world-renowned fungi hunters Stephen Axford and Catherine Marciniak is a deep dive into the damp corners of our national parks and rainforests. The pair are sweetly natured enthusiasts, both careful and curious, who explain how mushrooms are the fungal gateway before getting into the intricacies of their passion. As directors, these niche influencers are a touch one-paced, but the intricate wonder they depict their tiny discoveries with rings true.
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