A captivating series from Alfonso Cuarón

Renée Knights Disclaimer is a difficult book to adapt, a prestige soap opera carefully divided into two storylines: a man seeking revenge on the woman who destroyed his life and the woman trying to hold her family together under attack. The book switches back and forth between these halves in an almost whip-like manner, often with chapters that only consist of a few pages. And that style is largely replicated in the first episode of Alfonso Cuarón's excellent Apple TV+ drama of the same name, although it adds a third story arc: a flashback that captures the events that connect these very different people. It's a daring narrative approach (including…Surprisingly, from the man who has appealed to Oscar winners Gravity And Roma), but it totally works, leaving viewers with no idea where their loyalties should lie or what the true motives are behind these characters and their many, many secrets. Ultimately, this is a project that lives up to the prestige of its production, bringing some of the most renowned artisans and artists to arguably the only streaming service that can afford them.

The performances are consistently excellent, but the strength of DisclaimerThe two-part premiere is in production, an edit that flows seamlessly across multiple timelines with unique color palettes, narrative perspectives and tones. The opulence of an existence is juxtaposed with the bleak aesthetic of a home shrouded in sadness, and both are set against a flashback of bright sunshine and grinning youth. Shot by the master duo Emmanuel Lubezki and Bruno Delbonnel, Disclaimer is a reminder of how the line between filmmaking and television no longer exists. It looks absolutely fantastic, arguably better than anything on unnamed TV in 2024 Ripley.

The first chapter of Disclaimer gains a lot of power from its triptych structure, but that's hard to sum up, so let's look at each one individually:

In the happiest storyline, even though we know it's going to be rocky, a young couple are backpacking through Italy and are seen making love on a train for the first time in a shot that already showcases the sharp imagery of this show. The couple turns out to be young Jonathan Brigstocke (Louis Partridge) and Sasha (Liv Hill), but after her aunt dies in a car accident, she has to return to London and find Jonathan in one of the leave behind the most beautiful and romantic situations in all the countries in the world. After a trip to Pisa, he ends up on the Mediterranean, where he meets the young Catherine (Leila George), who is there with her son Nicholas after her husband returns to England. We'll learn that Jonathan and Catherine had such an affair that it resulted in hot photos that went down like a grenade many years later, but not exactly what happened to poor late Jonathan.

Many years later, acclaimed documentary filmmaker Catherine Ravenscroft (Cate Blanchett) receives a copy of a book in an unaddressed envelope. “Similarities to people, living or dead, are no coincidence.” The disclaimer should give her pause. One wonders if she also hesitated when she saw “For My Son Jonathan,” because we’ll learn that it’s a name she knows well.

reading The perfect stranger Later that night, the whole thing shocks Catherine so much that she vomits before attempting to burn the book in the sink as if it might be the only copy in existence. She hides the truth about what the book reveals to her husband Robert (Sacha Baron Cohen), but admits she thinks it's about her. An unseen narrator – mimicking the fact that Catherine's chapters in the source are written in the third person and Stephen's in the first person – puts it succinctly: “Your mask has fallen.”

Catherine turns to her son Nicholas (Kodi Smit-McPhee), whom she feels guilty about being a distant father and pushing him out of the nest so he can find his own path. We learn that he works in a department store and can barely communicate with his mother. He refuses to relive happier childhood memories or even put his phone away while they unpack his new apartment. When he later reveals that he also received a copy of it The perfect stranger It was given to him personally by what he thought was a grateful customer and mentioned that the protagonist dies at the end of the book, which Catherine was too scared to finish reading. And that the “selfish bitch” deserves it. Yikes.

The third arc of the premiere is for the memorable Stephen Brigstocke (a superbly suicidal Kevin Kline), who is deep in old apathy and doesn't care about the students he's grown tired of teaching. After finally cleaning out the closet left by his dead wife many years ago, he finds a purse with a key inside that unlocks the next chapter of his life. A drawer opens in which his wife Nancy left a manuscript that Stephen would turn into The perfect stranger. She also left behind photos that Jonathan had taken of young Catherine during their Italian affair. It's interesting to see how these photos connect dots in Stephen's memory, saying, “I thought she was just a spectator at the demise of my life.” The Stephen arc moves quickly through time compared to the other two, while he publishes the novel himself and puts his plan into action. “There was only one reader I wanted to reach,” he says, still wearing his late wife’s cardigan.

The second half of the premiere spends much longer in each of the three still-defined storylines, giving it a different dynamic and allowing us to linger in emotion rather than cause confusion. It's an episode about a woman trying to protect her family from the truth, but we're still not sure of all the details, which leaves us wondering if we want Stephen's grenades to go off or if Catherine wants them should defuse. Eventually, even Nicholas believes that the fictional version of his mother deserves her fate.

After seeing the first meeting between young Catherine and Jonathan seen in photos, the series' longest scene to date connects Stephen and Nicholas on the day he dropped off his book. Nicholas helped him buy a vacuum cleaner! But Stephen “couldn’t help but notice his impatience” and later even called him a “complete waste of space.” There is an interesting contrast between the happy, smiling son we see in Jonathan and the grumpy son played by Smit-McPhee. And it's kind of funny that Nicholas still thinks he got the book from someone he “helped” rather than “barely tolerated.”

The second of three key scenes in this back half of the premiere takes place ten years ago, shortly before Nancy Brigstocke (Lesley Manville) died. Catherine went to meet her and we learn that Nancy said her husband was dead and her life had been miserable. Catherine didn't even come to Jonathan's funeral – so this wasn't just an Italian affair if Nancy expected to see her at the services. There's a key line in this scene where Nancy says, “He saved your son.” From what? Out of WHO?

The main scene in the second chapter begins with Catherine cooking dinner – Robert's favorite dish, sole meunière – while her husband receives a package from Stephen consisting of another copy of the book and the photos Jonathan took during his date. Robert not only recognizes his wife, but also the hotel room they shared, and his feelings break so much that he begins to tremble. Interestingly, he goes to his son to see what he knows, but Nicholas was too young to remember anything.

Hours later, Robert finally comes home drunk and confronts Catherine. He shows her the photos but doesn't really listen to what she has to say. Could she reveal what really happened? It's a rough, raw and well-acted scene, especially on Blanchett's part, who struggles to reconcile her words and feelings. She promises that Nicholas didn't know, and she obviously wants to tell him something if he finds out Jonathan is dead. She thought she would get away with it. Not if Stephen Brigstocke has anything to say about it.

Crazy observations

• • How prestigious is this appointment? All five main actors have an Oscar nomination! And Blanchett has eight! It is one of the most respected ensembles in years. And then when you add the team of Cuarón, Delbonnel and Lubezki, it gets kind of crazy.
• • Why do you think Stephen uses Joseph Conrad's real name when he almost buys a vacuum cleaner? Sure, it's long enough to kill time so he can plant the envelope, but Stephen is also trying to unpack some truth Heart of Darkness.
• • The first line of an awards ceremony by Christiane Amanpour seems thematically essential to a story about how a book tears a life apart: “Beware of narrative and form.”
• • Stephen's self-publishing company is called Rhamnousia, an ancient Greek goddess also called “Nemesis.” Tricky, tricky Stephen.
• • Note that Stephen narrates his story arc, an unseen omniscient narrator does Catherine's, and there is none for Jonathan. This is just one of the ways Cuarón outlines the storylines.
• • I liked the part about how the joy of being a wine connoisseur comes from being able to afford it. This seems to be true of many high-priced hobbies that are all about displaying wealth.
• • Can we think about how often Cuarón works with strong female characters and the portrayals he borrows from people like Blanchett, Sandra Bullock and Yalitza Aparicio? He has an underrated talent in this regard.
• • It will be interesting to see how long Cuarón/Apple keeps the full truth about what happened between Catherine and Jonathan to themselves. And will viewers be patient if it takes weeks to find out?