This four-part BBC drama made for gripping viewing from first to last. Centring on a multi-million pound heist at a money counting house, it imaginatively moves back and forth in time until both time-streams converge in a repeat showing of the violent robbery, by which point the viewer has become informed as to the lead characters' emotional make-up, weaknesses and motivations. In the most inspired piece of writing / direction in the piece, we're at that point shown the climactic holdup scene with the perpetrators both masked and unmasked, showing us not only who did what at that point but also letting the viewer see how the criminals themselves are reacting to the pressure of their nefarious task.
The programme is also about the three lead "inside men" and their relationships with the women in their lives, for one, the de-facto leader played by Steven Mackintosh, it's his chance to re-assert his masculinity in his stale marriage, for another, Warren Brown, like Mackintosh last seen in "Luther", the petty crook, shoot for the sky / land in the gutter, delivery man, he's desperate to set his girl-friend, (later wife) up in the rich lifestyle she craves and for the third, Ashley Walters, it's a chance to escape his background of a jailbird father and drunken mother in providing a steady life for his new girlfriend and their forthcoming child.
My only problems with the well layered narrative were the too-obvious way Mackintosh's wife worked out who her captor was and the unbelievability of Mackintosh's motive, culminating in a slightly anti-climactic ending, while the constant shifts in time just occasionally seemed dizzying and confusing. There was also an awkward, artificial scene where Mackintosh was lecturing his newly adopted six-year old daughter on how wrong is sometimes right, something I'm not sure even the most hardened crook would do.
These quibbles apart, the story was quite excellently acted, Mackintosh outstanding as the shrinking violet who finds within himself the tough guy he'd been suppressing for years, with Brown almost as good as the dim but game accomplice and Walters likewise very good as the security man wrestling with his conscience.
The direction rarely flagged with the tension kept close to boiling point throughout in what was one of the best home-grown mini-series I've seen in a long time.
