What a performance! A feat of memory, of emotion, of power, and of physical coordination and sequence, and Comer never lets up.
She plays Tessa, an up and coming defence barrister. She sees herself as an integral and essential element of the legal system, believes in that system and that the defence barrister has their role in testing out the work of the police and CPS.
But when she finds herself the victim of a sexual assault the system suddenly looks very, very different. Gone are the checks and balances she put her faith in, now it's weighted against her, against women, against victims. And very much against those who find themselves challenging the legal establishment (her rapist is a colleague). From this perspective the concept of 'reasonable doubt' takes on new meaning.
While the performance is always strong, the script gets a little lost. It works well in the initial part, where she is the confident lawyer, but loses the sense of drama, and turns into clunky polemic to get it's message across at the end. It's a shame, for the set and effects are superb, the story being told an important one. Not just for sexual assault, but with wider implications for our society. So it's a shame that some of that impact, that communication, is dissipated by the ending. An important work to see nonetheless.
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