Forget the Emergency and other Grey’s Anatomy series. With “The Knick”, an exceptional series written and directed by Steven Soderbergh, you will take a dizzying and masterful dive into the heart of a famous New York hospital in the early 1900s.
American medical series are not exactly what is lacking in the audiovisual landscape. Between Grey’s Anatomy, Nip/Tuck, ER, Chicago Med, Body of Proof, Dr House, New Amsterdam, to name just a handful, medical series are an absolutely unmissable genre.
But in this vast ocean of scalpels, operating theaters, but also dramas and love stories, some stand out by their uniqueness. This is the case of The Knick, available on the Amazon platform via the Warner pass.
An electrifying dive into modern medicine
Inspired by the life of William Halsted, an authentic 19th century doctor considered one of the precursors of the surgical world, The Knick follows the fight led by Doctor Thackery (Clive Owens) in a New York hospital where the death rate is skyrocketing while most antibiotics have not yet seen the light of day.
At a time when surgical operations take place in public in an amphitheater, he becomes the new head of the surgical department. He inherits the position after the suicide of his mentor, following an operation which cost the life of their patient.
Thackery constantly pushes the limits of his discipline – notably by creating his own surgical instruments – but suffers from an increasingly serious cocaine addiction.
He will soon find himself in conflict with Cornelia Robertson: the young woman, whose father finances the hospital, imposes a new assistant on him, the brilliant Algernon Edwards. But according to Thackery, his patients will never agree to be operated on by a black doctor…
And while the “Knick” sees the arrival of electricity, the most archaic trafficking continues, between corruption of health services, trade in corpses and threats from the mafia…
HBO
Steven Soderbergh is directing the entire first season of The Knick out of the two it has. Unfortunately, it will not go until the third season, for lack of sufficient audience, and despite excellent reviews.
Carried high by the quality of its interpreters, Clive Owen in the lead who embodies a complex and avant-garde character, haloed by a formidable soundtrack by Cliff Martinez, which surprises first by its totally offbeat side with regard to the subject and the context of the series, but which in the end sticks incredibly well, The Knick is also an absolutely fascinating historical x-ray of an era.
HBO
In this case that of the city of New York at the turn of the century, in 1900. A cosmopolitan city, teeming with life, with its immigrant candidates forAmerican Way of Life but penniless. Its dirtiest misery, its class struggle, its dealings of all kinds. His ordinary racism, of which Dr. Algernon Edwards is the victim.
The progress (or not) of modern medicine (this is also the meaning of the catchline of the series: “Modern Medicine had to Start somewhere”), both guided by an ideal of progress but also -already- by mercantile considerations.
By its exceptional finesse of writing, the elegance of its staging, the quality of the interpretation, its realistic approach as well (the surgical interventions, both restorative, but also aesthetic, with some shock scenes to boot) , Soderbergh takes an entomologist’s look at an abundant and fascinating hive. Unmissable.