It’s Impossible to Overstate Just How Good Netflix’s ‘Ripley’ Is
There’s no shortage of glowing things to say about Ripley, Netflix’s masterful adaptation of Patricia Highsmith’s The Talented Mr. Ripley, which is proof that hiring great artists is the surest means of producing great art. Written and directed by Oscar-winning screenwriter Steven Zaillian (Schindler’s List, The Irishman, The Night Of), shot by Oscar-winning cinematographer Robert Elswit (There Will Be Blood), and starring acclaimed actor Andrew Scott (All of Us Strangers, Fleabag), this is a sumptuous, suspenseful, and altogether stellar black-and-white series. It not only avoids making a misstep along its cunningly winding journey, but it also manages to exceed expectations at every turn, such that there isn’t a gesture or suggestion in its eight episodes that doesn’t enhance its overpowering overall effect. Premiering April 4 on Netflix (after having originally been produced for, and by, Showtime), Ripley is the platonic ideal of television.
To find a series as perfectly realized as this is a shock unto itself, and the fact that Ripley is a retelling of an oft-told tale that’s already received two superb big-screen adaptations (1960’s Purple Noon and 1999's The Talented Mr. Ripley) simply makes its triumph that much more astonishing. Hewing closely to its source material even as it expands on it in canny ways that would make its subject proud, Zaillian’s saga begins in New York City with Tom Ripley (Scott), who gets by via low-level scams; he convinces doctors’ patients that they owe overdue payments, which he then has sent to his (fake) collection agency. Tom is a snake who hides in plain sight and knows how to play the angles. He’s also someone who has a particular knack—due to smarts and sociopathic self-interest—for slipping out of trouble, as he does when this ruse suddenly falls apart.
Unsure of what next move to make, he’s smiled upon by fortune when he's contacted by a private investigator (Bokeem Woodbine) who’s working for shipping magnate Herbert Greenleaf (Kenneth Lonergan). Greenleaf has mistakenly heard that Tom knows his son, Dickie (Johnny Flynn); he wants him to track Dickie down in Italy, where the scion has lived for some time in the lap of layabout luxury as an aspiring painter.