Product: State Of Play (2008)
Rating: 5.0
That's where the BBC and the media win
Political thrillers are always very tricky and difficult, maybe even dangerous. But the BBC loves those difficulties and carries them out with grace and effectiveness. The paramour of an English MP around 2005, hence quite obviously under a Labor government, dies by being pushed in front of an underground train in London. The MP is chairing a special committee on energy and is confronted to the hostility of oil companies and other energy lobbies. At the very same time a young black man is killed in an alley and another witness of this killing is shot though not dead. Are the three events connected since they happen in exactly the same time bracket, in sequence and in the same area?It will appear that the killer of the two people on the surface is the person who pushed the lady-friend of the MP, a lady who was important because she had just been hired by the MP for her energy competence and expertise, though it will appear that she was by far not the best qualified person and that she was very directly connected with one dominant oil company. So why was she hired? Pressure on the MP or favoritism from the MP? In the middle of the series we learn that she was pregnant, which the MP ignored. Most of the investigation is done by a small team of journalists and one important editor in one London newspaper. The police is marginalized by this active press team, and they resent it for a long time, though after a while they have to reckon the journalists have methods that enable them to get more information out of the witnesses, and even eventually the MP and other members of the majority and government. Just for this responsible but obstinate and constant role of English journalists this miniseries is a lesson to the world about the media, even concerning the clear pressure they are under from political bodies and from corporations, often disguised as some kind of criminal activity.To do that job is a real fight with the world, life and even death when a witness dies before questioning, or a murderer is shot dead at point blank by the special forces of the police preventing any kind of questioning and truth discovering, which can only come after an arrest, not a burial. The second genial element in this film is of course the tremendous case of lobbies, here oil and energy lobbies, and how they infiltrate all kinds of bodies to get direct information from inside, and at times this infiltration is done with the help and support of some members of the cabinet (ministers in other words, members of the government). They also use a lot of money to cover up all kinds of shady events and to pay all kinds of bills so that the beneficiaries are more lenient and attentive to their recommendations. That kind of lobbying is clearly criminal in the fact that it is always trying to hijack the political machine and to impose their interests as the norm for everyone. It is unjust, unequal, discriminatory, unreasonable most of the time, since it is the will of the very few who gets the ears of the decision makers of a nation and it is the interests of these few that are taken into account instead of the more objective needs of the vast majority, of the many. This miniseries is crystal clear about that kind of functioning and the perverse effects it may have on the governmental and legislative machines. But the film is a lot more than just that.It is full of suspense and that suspense never stops till the very last minute of the sixth episode. The suspense is about the role of the MP, the determination of his best friend, the freelance journalist leading the investigation, the wavering of the MP's wife who should be irreversibly angry at that paramour and affair, and at the pregnancy of that outsider, and she should either accept the situation for the sake of their children, or ask for a divorce, the second probably first. But she beats about the bush and develops an affair with the journalist for the obvious reason of getting some information from him, and drops him at the end with the beautiful words "arrogant prick". And it is at this moment the role of the MP in the killing is going to be finally discovered with a final revelation from him to the journalist. Have a good time watching that miniseries of nearly six hours and never believe what you may think is obvious at any moment in the film.It is so well built that you will have to wait for the last five minutes to finally be sure of what the truth is, just like journalists must do: never work on conviction or feeling but on tangible hard evidence, otherwise you may end in prison.Dr Jacques COULARDEAU