A 'does what it says on the tin' title that nonetheless doesn't do justice to this hour-long drama based on a real case. We have nothing against BBC3, but don't often watch it, and this was a worthwhile exception. 17-year-old Ashley (Georgina Campbell) meets Reece (Royce Pierreson) at a party. They have friends in common and even went to the same school, and their obvious mutual attraction soon blossoms into a relationship that has Ashley telling friends she's happy and in love. Reece, however, has a possessive streak and strange ideas about domestic harmony, and things turn sour when Ashley discovers she is pregnant. He promises her the earth to keep their baby, but refuses to live with her and is unfaithful. His short fuse has him lashing out, in front of their daughter, and his physical strength and manipulative talk inflicts real damage on her bodily and mental health.
The spoiler is in the title, but what makes this worth watching are the nuanced performances from the leads (and nice to see Kate Hardie on screen again). They are good enough to make you understand what is often incomprehensible: why would anyone stay with a violent partner? Ashley is young, impressionable and in love, wanting a father for her daughter, and drained of her natural confidence by her intimidating boyfriend. He has a predator's instinct for undermining her, and literally and metaphorically battering her into submission to his will.
A brave drama. The news may feature celebrity-led protest against gender-based atrocities abroad, but domestic violence on our doorstep is on the rise too.
Intriguing Irish crime drama about the disappearance of a fourteen-year-old girl and the desperate search by her parents. Each of the four episodes covers different aspects of the same timeline, from the day she went missing to almost two years later. It makes good use of the device in slow reveals of Amber's story and its aftermath, with the slow and painful disintegration of the family, and aside from a slightly contrived third episode around a mobile phone (no spoilers) it's gripping and harrowing stuff.
In opting for the life-like route, though, it probably splits its audience. It's a haunting exploration of how much damage is caused by a lost child, but it lacks a dramatically satisfying end and leaves many loose ends: will Amber's father Ben continue his efforts on the 'dark web' and risk imprisonment? What part did the prisoner who knew about the mermaid mural play? Why did Amber get off the train in the middle of nowhere? How did her lamp end up in the water? Is the man on the beach with his dog a suspect? And what about the boy in the chatroom, who was in Nerissa's with Amber's friend who said she didn't know him? Intriguing, but frustrating.
Penny Dreadful, Sky Atlantic's new huge-budget, high-concept TV drama began last week. It's dripping with high production values, but at the same time it's a strange mix of things.
First, it reminds us of Alan Moore. Like Moore's The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen, it mixes various iconic stories and characters into a steampunk sort of setting. While League had Alan Quartermain, Tom Sawyer and Captain Nemo, Penny has Frankenstein, but also overlaps with Dorian Grey and Mina Harker from Dracula.
Second, it reminds us of Ripping Yarns. Ripping Yarns deliberately set out to debunk this sort of tosh (particularly in the episode The Curse of The Claw), and also loved getting cameos from famous friends.
Within these confines it's pretty good, and it's great to see Timothy Dalton in such a meaty role, but as with a lot of the recent Sky stuff, it's not as good as it thinks it is. Yes, it's suspenseful... but one person's 'nail-biting suspense' is another person's 'get on with it', and more often than not we fall into the second camp.
Tom Hollander is a genius. He bears no more than a passing resemblance to poet Dylan Thomas, and to most viewers is more familiar in a dog collar as 'Rev', but within fifteen minutes is utterly convincing and, more, sympathetic as the gifted, spoiled, self-pitying alcoholic. This takes his Big Apple trip in 1953 which proves to be his last, and interweaves just enough of his prime moments in life to give a real sense of the intense feelings that drove him to sublime heights of verse and terrible lows at the bottom of several bottles. When it comes to drink and women, he just can't seem to help himself, and his fame and charm give him abundant access to both, much to the anger of his wife in Laugharne, Caitlin, and his mistress in New York. This recreates early '50s NY on probably a fraction of 'Mad Men's budget and while some of the accents stray eastwards of the Atlantic and even of Wales, this remains a beguiling 80 minutes, and a fitting tribute to a flawed, fabulously gifted man who died at only 39.
Daniel (Philip Glenister) tries to reconcile his wayward brother Robbo (Steven Mackintosh) with their dad Samuel (Bernard Hill) over a drink in a central Mancunian pub. Unfortunately for him, the truce fails and they are sitting feet away from the IRA bomb on the day it exploded in 1996. Nobody dies, of-course, but it proves a catalyst in all their lives. Before the end of the episode (one of three) Sam has had a stroke, Robbo has come up with not one but two insane plans to clear his debt and Daniel has begun an affair with the pub cleaner, whom he rescued from the wreckage.
This has nice moments but is mostly either predictable or unbelievable. The use of northern staples the Stone Roses and the Smiths on the soundtrack is lazy and responsible Daniel's sudden need to escape from his close (adoptive) family into the arms of a stranger just doesn't ring true. So far, this is largely a waste of a good cast, in-particularly Steven Mackintosh, who turns in an ill-advised imitation of the drug dealer in 'Withnail & I'. If you like Madchester, and these are typical residents, you may like it a little less after watching this.
John Banville's crime series hero could have been written for the lugubrious features of Gabriel Byrne. We're in familiar territory, but noir with a capital N and handsomely mounted. 50s Dublin and 50s Boston probably never looked this good but who cares when it's 90 minutes of pure escapism and Byrne's craggy features?
Quirke is a man of mystery and lots of alcohol. In common with his fellow crime protagonists he has no discernible first name, comes from shady origins and has suffered loss and loneliness. He has enough of the Marlowesque about him to enliven proceedings, however, and this first of three feature-length tales starts very close to home, with Quirke's complicated family. He finds his adoptive brother in his path lab late one night, forging a death certificate of a young woman, and this leads to a chain of violence and disclosure of old family secrets involving hidden identities and the brutal treatment of young, pregnant women. From these basic ingredients, Banville's story weaves a mesmerising spell. If the next two are as good as this, Quirke must be here to stay.
As a piece of televised theatre this works far better than it ought to, considering the production is filmed in the new Sam Wanamaker Playhouse at the Globe in candlelight. Gemma Arterton's Duchess perhaps lacks the gravitas of previous incumbents of the role, but is as young and vivacious as her character was written and the humour in the earlier acts is to the fore.
Webster's play is one of the best Jacobean revenge tragedies - which means one of the bloodiest - and encompasses passion, incest, madness and murderous violence. The language is easier than Shakespeare for a 21st Century audience to understand and the theme of women's oppression as valid now as it was then. Described as 'a theatrical event', it brings the play alive for a far wider audience than could cram into the theatre on the South Bank, and will no doubt be a good secondary experience of theatre for pupils stuyding for GCSEs and A-Levels. Is it as good an experience as being in a theatre and seeing it live? No, and could never be, but it's a brave attempt to recreate the original conditions for the audience, and has made us want to visit the Playhouse.
