Episode 6 of Gracepoint aired last night and saw another tragedy hit the small seaside community. Read our review here - please be aware that the article contains spoilers.
The power of the press to destroy lives is explored in
Episode 6 of Gracepoint as the back
story of one of the small Californian town’s most respected residents is
uncovered and his reputation is thrown to the mob.
Feelings in the small town of Gracepoint have reached
boiling point. An atrocity has struck at the heart of the small community and
so far nobody has been punished for the crime. Therefore it takes a badly
timed, poorly researched and unfortunately edited press article to give the
people their first real scapegoat as the mob turns upon one of the town’s trusted
citizens. Jack Reinhold (Nick Nolte) has worked with the young people of the
town for years and years – many of the residents have at some point been a
member of his Wildlife Group. The rumours have already started but the press revelations
about his past cast a sinister shadow from which Jack will not recover. Nick
Nolte demonstrates why he deserves his multiple Academy Award nominations in
his moving portrayal of the once beloved old man whose life in the town he has
come to love is collapsing around him. In Nolte’s weatherbeaten face there’s
the look of a man who doubts he has the strength to start again. And if this
isn’t sad enough, his history is positively heartbreaking.
Ironically there are parallels between Mark Solano (Michael Peña),
the father of murdered Danny, and Jack himself. Both lost their son when he was
a child. Both had sexual relations with their partner while she was still
technically a child herself. Jack explains that his loss was the death of his
marriage. Is this why Mark passes up the opportunity to call off and inform the
lynch mob? Because Jack shows him what could happen to him and Beth (Virginia
Kull)? Or because revealing Jack’s crime would invite questions about the
legality of his own past? Or invite questions about what he will do to protect
his own daughter, also underage and in a physical relationship? Whatever way, Mark cannot bear to look at Jack and rather
than clear his name he advises him to move away.
Jack’s problems started with another betrayal, that of Owen
(Kevin Zegers) under the misguided influence of the self-serving Renee (Jessica
Lucas). Owen was manipulated into posting the piece by Renee with the promise
of fame and money and a way of helping his mother out. Whatever happened
between the post and the print run – and perhaps Renee had a hand in this – the
piece is devastating for the whole town and Owen realises the damage he has
done too late. He refuses to help Renee further. She is unfazed. Her work is
done. When all news is exhausted here she will move to the next town and find
more lives in which to meddle. But here she still has plenty of new material
with Dean’s (Kendrick Sampson) testimony about Jack’s apparently tactile
methods of working with the boys. There is another more damning story in this,
and she won’t have to share the byline with a smalltown cub reporter.
Meanwhile the Solanos try to rebuild their lives. At the
start of the episode there seems no hope, and the police reconstruction of the
night of Danny’s death only serves to deepen their despair. They are three
people leading separate lives in the same house: the parents creep round one
another while daughter Chloe (Madalyn Horcher) gleans information where she
can. It could be the end of the road for Beth and Mark who discuss the distinct
possibility that they are drifting apart. Mark knows that he is the reason that
Beth lost all of her dreams. He is dismayed that Beth is even considering
getting rid of the baby that she carries. However, it’s not due to resentment
of Mark that makes Beth despise her pregnancy so much – it’s a sense of
betrayal of Danny. How can she bring another child into the world when she
failed at raising this one? Beth needs to say this aloud – to Paul (Kevin
Rankin), of course – before she can move on. She also needs to tackle the issue
of Gemma (Sarah-Jane Potts), which she does in explosive fashion. By the end of
the episode, both Mark and Beth seem to have exorcised some demons and they
look to be in a place where they can start to mourn Danny as a couple at last.
Ellie (Anna Gunn) has her own family problems to tackle as
she tries to support her sister Sara (Janet Kidder). Sara is after only one
thing – money, to dig herself out of her latest hole. She thinks she’s found a
way to guarantee some too. Apparently she saw someone on the night of the
murder, and she’s going to make Ellie hand over cash for the privilege of
hearing it. There’s another family link to the case. Owen discovers that his
dad’s boat has been taken and it doesn’t take Hugo Garcia (Darcy Laurie) long
to work out that it’s the burned boat, and therefore the boat used to transport
Danny. And unbeknownst to her, Susan Wright (Jacki Weaver), otherwise known as Ruth Erlick, has shown an interest in her son Tom and has invited him round to help her walk her dog.
There are new clues emerging. The phone that Jack says he
recovered from a kayak is allegedly Danny’s, but Ellie says that she is sure
he had a smartphone. There are also three cigarette butts recovered from the
beach, an unusual high tar brand. It also implies that the killer stood smoking
by Danny’s body for some time after transporting him to the beach and arranging
the ‘accident’ scene. So, who would smoke such a thing? Carver is still hoping
that one of his three main leads – Jack, Paul Coates and backpacker Lars
Pierson – will come to something. Carver seems pretty certain, though, that
Jack is hiding something, and this perhaps fuels his reluctance to protect him.
He is hoping Jack will crack and confess.
It’s a fairly tense and grim episode but there are some
lighter moments. Carver seriously misjudges Gemma’s kooky friendliness as an
attempt to flirt and is comically knocked back. Ellie too is the subject of
male interest as Hugo asks her out for a drink, prompting a bit of lighthearted
teasing from Carver. Carver certainly seems more relaxed in his dealings with
Ellie, he even praises Tom for carrying out the reconstruction. But the bubble
is burst when Ellie mentions Rosemont, and Carver is rocked by the assumption
that she has always been considering his failure there.
The ending is a real tragedy, a life destroyed unnecessarily
and an event that is bound to have implications for a number of Gracepoint
residents whose actions contributed to Jack’s decision to take his own life. It
also leaves the investigation floundering: Carver is not as certain about any
of his other suspects and he has no evidence that points the finger at anybody.
He needs to find something significant soon or Ellie won’t be the only person uttering the word ‘Rosemont’ around him.
The series continues on ITV Encore on Wednesday 13th May at 10pm BST.
Comments
Post a Comment