This - directed by Keith Boak - is the hardest watch of the series so far, as it deals with impressionable teenage schoolgirls being seduced through presents and flattery and drugs into becoming unwilling prostitutes for a gang of Pakistani men. And these girls don't seem stupid, but they all seem to come from unhappy home lives.
Begins with two bangs - Nikki witnesses a barefoot girl being run over and helps her; Harry's flat blows up!
Rather successful in that we see that miserable fate of one of the girls imprisoned and desperate to escape cross cut with how it all begins for another couple of girls.
Elyes Gabel is good as the charismatic gang leader, with Faraz Ayub, Ashwin Bolar and thankfully Tony Jayawardena as the slightly thick one who knows they are doing wrong and eventually comes to the rescue (also good; A Street Cat Named Bob). The girls are Emma Amos, Juliet Cowan, Chloe May.
A taciturn detective is Sam Troughton; Sanjeev Bhaskar also features.
To leaven the dark proceedings, Harry moves into Nikki's flat (though doesn't get much more sleep there!)
What is also quite disturbing that although we see all the gang being arrested, we're not convinced there will be enough evidence to convict them all. And this was some years before the Bradford grooming scandal, also.
No comments:
Post a Comment