Richard Roxburgh stars as Cleaver Greene, a criminal solicitor who employs unconventional methods in the courtroom and leans toward self-destructive behavior in his private life in this sardonic Australian law series. Greene is a divorced man with a string of affairs and failed relationships (one with a former hooker who is now dating the tax attorney prosecuting him for tax evasion), a gambling addiction (he receives regular beatings from a mob collector), and an appetite for cocaine and sex—the last a recipe for disaster that ends with him sleeping with his best friend's wife. Greene lives in a state of chaos while professionally gravitating towards challenging cases. Hugo Weaving guest stars in the first episode as a genius economist who happens to be a confessed (and unrepentant) cannibal, and Sam Neill plays a family doctor arrested for bestiality in a later case. Where British shows tend to showcase lovable eccentrics, Rake is content to let viewers enjoy Greene's reckless disregard and scruffy wit without any worries about redemption (the series is even more liberal in its lax moral compass and gratuitous nudity). Roxburgh doesn't try to make Greene sympathetic but he does make him fun and rather charming in his own sly way. Greg Kinnear starred in a short-lived American adaptation of the show—a flop that failed to capture the cheeky attitude of the Australian original. Compiling all eight episodes from the 2010 first season, this is recommended. [Note: Rake: Series 2 is also newly available.] (S. Axmaker)
Rake: Series 1
Acorn, 3 discs, 450 min., not rated, DVD: $39.99 August 7, 2017
Rake: Series 1
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