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Flying Blind

5/10

Stars: Helen McCrory, Najib Oudghiri, Kenneth Cranham, Lorcan Cranitch, Razane Jammal Writers: Naomi Wallace, Bruce McLeod, Caroline Harrington

Director: Katarzyna Klimkiewicz

It’s good to see a fortysomething actress, in this case Helen McCrory, giving a strong performance as a fortysomething aeronautics expert and sometime lecturer who embarks on a sexually-charged affair with 24-year-old French-Algerian student Najib Oudghiri in Bristol.

First-time feature film director Katarzyna Klimkiewicz makes good use of a patently low budget and Bristol locations which help give the blend of sex, eroticism and, when McCrory is held by the law, of thriller an added impact. McCrory’s potent acting holds the rather too frequently schematic story together and there is excellent support from Kenneth Cranham as her father.

Since the BBC spent your licence money co-producing this small scale drama, my advice is to wait until the Corporation deigns to show it on the small screen – where Flying Blind was destined – rather than paying to see it right now. Somewhat strangely, considering it is basically a TV movie, the film was shown in wide screen format which is not particularly suited to the small screen. But I guess that’s Show Business, BBC-style.

Alan Frank

UK 2013. UK Distributor: Soda Pictures. Colour.
93 minutes. Widescreen. UK certificate: 15.

Guidance ratings (out of 3): Sex/nudity 2, Violence/Horror 0, Drugs 0, Swearing 2.

Review date: 12 Apr 2013