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(For Americans not familiar with the show, the show's first season - including these two episodes - is available on DVD, but you'll most likely have to find a Canadian vendor to buy it. The plot of the show centers around Dominic Da Vinci, a coroner in Vancouver - but the show is nothing like "Quincy." I highly recommend the show overall, even outside of the episodes in which Gabrielle appears. If you're a fan of "Corner Gas" and are lucky enough to get the first season of "Da Vinci's Inquest" on DVD, you'll really be taken aback by the bad guy in the first three episodes. )
OVERALL IMPRESSIONS: These episodes are as disturbing as anything you'll ever see on "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit," and your first instinct upon seeing them will likely be to lock your kids in a closet until they're 30 - and then arm them with pistols when you let them out. There's a lot of well-produced suspense in these episodes, particularly in the first one when Joanna is escaping and it looks like the male half of the sleazy duo that abducted her might catch her. Gabrielle's handling of Joanna's character was absolutely gut-wrenching and will leave you screaming at your TV set from the second half of the first episode on. You should be warned, however, that if shows like "Law & Order: Special Victims Unit" tend to keep you up at night, these episodes will cost you sleep too - and make sure your kids are far away from the screen when you play them.
KUDOS TO GABRIELLE: Her performance, particularly in "The Capture," is beyond astonishing. She earned a Gemini nomination for it in the "Best Performance by an Actress in a Guest Role, Dramatic Series" category, and it's inconceivable to me that she didn't win. Seeing the performance that was supposedly better than Gabrielle's was here is definitely on my "to do" list. Gabrielle's role here couldn't have been easy to play, but she did such a phenomenal job that until I see the performance that won a Gemini over hers, I feel perfectly safe in assuming that she got badly ripped off.
From start to finish, Gabrielle's performance is textbook., even if it isn't always easy to watch. The role calls for a likeable and innocent victim, and she nails it from her first scene on. The way she handled Joanna's escape, interview with the police, and assistance to them in nailing her captors was just spot on, including an absolutely haunting scene in a car when she starts singing as if she's the only person left on Earth. Gabrielle's last scene in "The Capture," when Joanna comes face-to-face with one of her captors, is thoroughly chilling and one of the few scenes I've ever seen which actually merits the use of the word "unforgettable." These two episodes would have been twice the price of the DVD set, even if the rest of the episodes on it had been awful.
Almost as impressive were the performances of Jaimz Woolvet and Sabrina Grdevich, who played Joanna's abductors. Those roles called for nothing less than absolutely loathsome human scum, and Woolvet and Grdevich rose to the occasion in spades. You'll find yourself rooting for both of them to catch a bullet between the eyes from the first time you see them.
TRIVIA:
1.) The killers in both "The Hunt" and "The Capture" are based on real life Canadian serial killers Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka. I'm not much of a true crime junkie, but I know of no American equivalents to these two; any Internet search under their names will result in quite a bit of highly disturbing reading.
2.) Thanks to my better half, I learned that these two episodes are a "who's who" of people who have appeared on "Highlander." There are at least a dozen (and I may well have missed some): Nicholas Campbell, George Gordon, Ian Tracey, Venus Terzo, Sue Mathew, Robert Wisden, Duncan Fraser, Nathaniel Deveaux, Alf Humphreys, Matthew Walker, Phil Hayes, and Gabrielle (several, including Gabrielle, appeared in more than one episode). Of this list, only Gabrielle has the distinction of having played an immortal who didn't wind up headless!
APPEARING HERE AND ELSEWHERE WITH GABRIELLE: Alex Diakun, who plays Chick Savoy, also played Crandall in the movie "Dead Man's Gun" (in the "Fool's Gold segment) and Pallas in "Starlight." Alf Humphreys, who plays the car lot manager, also played Robert Jenkins in "Breaking News" episode "Wall to Wall Plane Crash." David Lewis, who plays the red-headed man, also plays an officer #1 in "Breaking the Surface: The Greg Louganis Story," Derek in "Pasadena" episode "The Truth Hurts," Ned Simon in "Voyage of Terror," Dylan Andrews in "Liebe auf den 2. Blick" ("Love at Second Sight"), and Hubert Peterson in "The New Addams Family" episode "New Neighbors Meet the Addams Family." Duncan Frasier, who plays Staff Sergeant Regan, also played Big Paddy in the movie "Dead Man's Gun" (in the "Fool's Gold" segment) and Mr. Lemieux in "Madison" episode "Bad Girls." Ian Tracey, who plays Detective Mick Leary, also played Dale in "Rupert's Land." Max Martini, who plays Danny Leary, also played Nate Natleson in "Breaking News." Nathaniel DeVeaux, who plays the Portland cop, also played Grieger in "The Disappearance of Vonnie" and James Coleman in "Voyage of Terror." Robert Wisden, who plays Chief Coroner James Flynn, also played Dr. Morse in the "Fantasia" episode of "The Chris Isaak Show," Armand in "Floating Away," Dana in "Judgment Day: The John List Story," and Detective Randy Winkler in "The Disappearance of Vonnie." Sarah Strange, who plays Helen, also played Carol Lemieux in "Madison." Venus Terzo, who plays Detective Angela Kosmo, also played Molly in "Sentinel" episode "Smart Alec" and Theresa Fernandez in "Voyage of Terror." Warren Takeuchi, who plays Wayne, also played a cop in "As Time Runs Out."