“The Alienist”– Something Wicked This Way Comes

“The Alienist”, a TNT psychological thriller set in 1896, is based on the novel by Caleb Carr. People with mental illness were once considered “alienated from society,” unfathomable to doctors and laymen alike. Those who thought they could treat them were referred to as alienists, pre-dating the Freudian psychiatric movement by more than a decade. The Alienist foreshadows the Freudian theory of the unconscious, and the incipient emergence of forensics (including the first attempts at fingerprinting). If that is not enough, the series also foreshadows the suffragist movement, through the eyes of a police assistant trying to break through the glass ceiling of the NYPD.

The Alienist opens with a series of haunting, gruesome murders of boy prostitutes, terrorizing New York City . Newly appointed police commissioner Theodore Roosevelt (Brian Geraghty) calls upon criminal psychologist/alienist) Dr. Laszlo Kreizler (Daniel Brühl) and newspaper illustrator John Moore (Luke Evans) to conduct a secret investigation. They are joined by Sara Howard (Dakota Fanning), a headstrong secretary determined to become the city’s first female police detective and who is the key to solving the crimes. Using the emerging disciplines of psychology and early forensic investigation techniques, this band of outsiders sets out to find and apprehend New York City’s infamous serial killer.

The dark foreboding era of the Gilded Age is impeccably captured, immersing the viewer into a time period when the poor and the uber-rich were seen as two separate species. J.P. Morgan, the Astor family and their rarified social circles are played as the underbelly influencing not only finance and industry but also law enforcement and the news media.

Police Commissioner Teddy Roosevelt must maneuver his way through the power structure of Morgan and the Astors while the journalist Lincoln Steffens is trying to keep everyone honest. The acting is superb, with wonderful ensemble performances. The ending is a bit weak, an attempt to humanize the unsympathetic anti-hero Dr. Kreizler, and could have been omitted.

Nonetheless, this enthralling portrait of the mean streets of Victorian New York City is a keeper.