It's interesting how the DOCTOR BLAKE mysteries make use of intertexts in constructing their tales. In the series so far there have been references to the Australian cricket team of the Fifties led by Richie Benaud, and Hitchcock's VERTIGO. In this episode the allusions are to a much more ancient event; the grave-robbing antics of Burke and Hare. In Pino Amenta's production the grave-robbers are Blake (Craig McLachlan) and Lawson (Joel Tobeck), who are not out to sell the remains for financial gain, but rather investigating why there should be two corpses in one coffin on not one, but two occasions. On the way have to investigate the nefarious activities of a funeral director (Andrew S. Gilbert) and his surly daughter (Esther Stephens), as well as a bullet-headed ex-union activist (Dennis Coard).
Perhaps the plot of this episode is slightly more complicated than others - it's still not quite clear how the activist actually became involved in the situation that caused the crime(s) in the first place - but this production nonetheless lifts the stones of civilized life in Ballarat to expose some seamy goings-on underneath. What seems like an ordinary Christian funeral turns out to be something far more sinister.
Perhaps the plot of this episode is slightly more complicated than others - it's still not quite clear how the activist actually became involved in the situation that caused the crime(s) in the first place - but this production nonetheless lifts the stones of civilized life in Ballarat to expose some seamy goings-on underneath. What seems like an ordinary Christian funeral turns out to be something far more sinister.
