MHz Choice announced today its programming slate for January 2024, which includes seven new Euro TV series and one returning fan favorite.
MHz Choice is kicking off the new year with a bunch of new, and one returning, Euro TV titles. Check ’em out!
JANUARY 2
The Island of 30 Coffins (L’île aux 30 cercueils) (France)
Based on the novel by “Lupin” creator Maurice LeBlanc, this mystery-crime drama limited series stars Virginie Ledoyen (Nona and Her Daughters, Just One Look, 8 Women) as Christine, who lost her son at birth 15 years ago. Or so she believes… until she receives a video suggesting he might not be dead. This prompts her to return to the island of Sarek, where she grew up and gave birth. As Christine searches for the truth, a series of deaths stirs up terror and a local prophecy of “the 30 coffins.”
The six-episode drama costars Charles Berling (Captain Marleau, Frozen Dead) and Stanley Weber (Time Is a Killer, Outlander).
Fosca Innocenti: Season 1 (Italy)
Vanessa Incontrada (Captain Maria) stars in this crime drama as Fosca Innocenti, the vice police chief of Arezzo, who works at a police station composed almost exclusively of women — all of them experts in criminal investigations, analysis, and mystery solving. Fosca has her life together, working at the station and living in the country farmhouse inherited from her father, where she loves horseback riding. Her weakness, though, is Cosimo (Francesco Arca, The Promised Life) — her best friend, the man she is secretly in love with, and the person who, by announcing his imminent departure for America, will push Fosca to make a definitive decision about her personal life.
JANUARY 9
Once Upon a Time in Vigata (C’era una volta Vigata)
This anthology series includes three standalone TV movie mysteries from the late, great Andrea Camilleri, the creator of Inspector Montalbano. (Note that the English titles shown below may be different when the episodes arrive on MHz Choice.)
Michele Riondino (The War is Over, The Lions of Sicily) stars in The Knight’s Move (La mossa del cavallo: c’era una volta Vigata) as Giovanni Bovara, the Tax Ministry’s new chief inspector of the mills in 1877 Italy. From Genoa, he is sent back to his hometown of Vigata in Sicily, where he investigates illegal activities related to milling while dealing with the dialectal and cultural barriers of post-unification Italy. Through his inquiries, Bovara discovers the existence of a clandestine mill and an ingenious system by which the millers are left free to evade the tax — and then finds himself entangled in something much greater… and very dangerous.
Francesco Scianna (Mafia Only Kills in Summer, The Trial) stars in The Hunting Season (La stagione della caccia: c’era una volta Vigata) as Alfonso Fofò La Matina, a pharmacist who opens a new pharmacy in 1880 Vigata. Shortly thereafter, strange events begin to occur, including several tragedies in a nobleman’s family.
Alessio Vassallo (The Young Montalbano, The Tailor’s Wife) stars in The Telephone Concession (La concessione del telefono – C’era una volta Vigata) as Filippo “Pippo” Genuardi, a wood merchant who writes a series of letters to the prefect Vittorio Marascianno (Corrado Guzzanti, Murders at Barlume) to request the installation of a telephone line in 1890s Vigata. When he doesn’t get an answer to any of them, the philandering Pippo resorts to a different measure that ultimately puts him in a dangerous predicament with members of the mafia and of the police, as well as with his family.
JANUARY 16
The Shift: Season 1 (Dag & Nat) (Denmark)
Sofie Gråbøl (The Killing) leads the cast of this drama as Ella (Gråbøl), a midwife in a hospital maternity ward. Ella and her colleagues go about their work with conviction and ideals, but all too often the pressure and the mental and physical strain of the work get to them, pushing them to their limits.
Renewed for a second season, the series’ eight-episode first season costars Pål Sverre Hagen (Kon-Tiki), Marijana Jankovic (Deliver Us), Sara Hjort Ditlevsen (Rita), Afshin Firouzi (Borgen), and Mattias Nordkvist (Missing), amongst others.
Breaking Point: Season 1 (Am Anschlag – Die Macht der Kränkung) (Germany)
Inspired by the nonfiction book Die Macht der Kränkung by Reinhard Haller, Season 1 of this crime drama-psychological thriller anthology series tells the story of the people involved in a shooting at the Sunshine City shopping center, and of their personal stories and underlying emotional anguish that made them living time bombs, culminating in this act of violence.
The Season 1 cast includes Murathan Muslu (Barbarians), Julia Koschitz (Anatomy of Evil), Johanna Wokalek (Redemption Road), Ulrike Willenbacher (Tatort: Munich), and Jonas Holdenrieder (Tatort: Munich), amongst others.
JANUARY 23
The Winemaker (Im Netz der Camorra) (Germany)
Tobias Moretti (Inspector Rex, Backwoods Crime) leads the cast of this new thriller series as Matteo, a successful winemaker who has built a comfortable life for himself and his family. But when an old friend shows up in the vineyard, his secret past comes back to haunt him with a vengeance — forcing him to choose between his new life or his past one as a mafioso.
The four-episode drama costars Ursina Lardi (Enemies), Antonia Moretti (Pagan Peak), Harald Windisch (Walking on Sunshine), and Fabrizio Romagnoli (Medici), amongst others.
JANUARY 30
Germinal (France)
Based on the novel Germinal by Émile Zola, considered one of the greatest French novels, this historical drama tells the story of the Anzin coal miners’ strike in northern France in the 1860s. The series also follows the personal story of Étienne Lantier (Louis Peres, How I Became a Super Hero), a (fictional) young worker disgusted by the poverty and exploitation of the coal miners.
Costars in the six-episode drama include Guillaume de Tonquédec (Speakerine), Thierry Godard (Spiral), Alix Poisson (The Returned), Natacha Lindinger (Agatha Christie’s Criminal Games), and Sami Bouajila (Ganglands), amongst others.
Professor T: Season 4 (Germany)
Matthias Matschke (The Book Thief, The Grand Budapest Hotel, Flemming) stars in this German remake of the hit Flemish-language mystery-crime drama series as Jasper Thalheim, a highly-gifted psychologist and criminology professor at Cologne University. He’s also a high-functioning neurotic and germophobe with several dozen psychological disorders and a brilliant mind, one who helps the police crack their most puzzling cases. (Video is from Season 3)
All of these titles will stream in the US and Canada exclusively on MHz Choice and its digital channels, including MHz Choice on Amazon, starting on the dates shown above. (Note that scheduling changes can occur at any time and without prior notice.)
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