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Cillian Murphy’s gang leader Tommy Shelby mutated from plausible historical character to Zelig in a potboiler
At 5.24pm on 14 September 2014, Stephen King tweeted: “Watching a cool British series called Peaky Blinders.” Until then, TV shows from Birmingham were not cool. Pebble Mill at One, Crossroads, The Golden Shot and Citizen Khan were many things but cool wasn’t one of them.
Peaky Blinders tore up the playbook from its first scene, when Cillian Murphy rode into shot like Clint Eastwood minus poncho, but plus tweed suit and matching cap. Director Otto Bathurst said his aim was to create something like Blade Runner set in post-first world war Birmingham and he did so in that opening shot, with flames decorously bursting from a factory furnace to backlight Murphy’s equestrian silhouette and ash falling through the air like snowflakes. Continue reading...