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The Honourable Woman

A powerful new BBC First thriller led by Maggie Gyllenhaal is dense, elegant and conceals some killer moves.

Picture shows: Nessa Stein (MAGGIE GYLLENHAAL)It’s no surprise that film actors are turning to television. When they are as rich an experience as The Honourable Woman, an actor would walk over hot coals to land the part. This BBC drama is a showcase of talent both on and off the screen led by Maggie Gyllenhaal as a UK businesswoman.

She plays Nessa Stein, the head of the Stein Group, driven to helping resolve the Middle East peace process through philanthropic efforts such as laying communication cables in the West Bank. But Nessa has a daunting back story given her father was executed by the PLO. Her brother Ephra (Andrew Buchan) was with her when they, as young children, watched him murdered.

As this incredibly dense thriller by Hugo Blick (The Shadow Line) unfolds, there’s another death: this time Israeli dignitary Samir Meshal, just as he was about to awarded a contract by Nessa. Investigating his death is MI5, headed up by Sir Hugh Hayden-Hoyle (Stephen Rea). But another mystery will also grip these characters, involving Atika (Lubna Azabal), the nanny to Ephra and his wife Rachel (Katherine Parkinson).

The pacing of The Honourable Woman is decidedly filmic. Yes it’s a bit of a slow-burn, but there are lengthy scenes that seek to establish character and never lose their nerve in a medium not known for dwelling in the moment. The pacing here is elongated but confident.

The other distinction is that the female characters get all the good stuff, with the possible exception of Stephen Rea.

Gyllenhaal has poise and presence, brilliantly playing a British character alongside other UK nationals. One can only imagine that Helen Mirren and Gillian Anderson were out to lunch the day this casting call came through. The role affords her a steely, public persona masking a vulnerable woman in the middle of an international thriller. She is surrounded by other strong female characters, played here by Eve Best, Janet McTeer, and NIDA graduate Genevieve O’Reilly.

Stephen Rea as MI5’s outgoing head is masterful with his use of silence, as he seeks to unravel a game of espionage.

Hugo Blick as both writer and director imbues his 8 part tale with plenty of subtext, maximised by eye-catching photography and a cinematic score. Set predominantly in the UK, with some scenes in the Middle East, it explores questions of compromise, facing one’s past and a tug of war between personal and political high stakes.

This may not have the TV turning points of Homeland or Spooks, but The Honourable Woman has some killer cards up its sleeve, more fitting of a searing night in the theatre.

 The Honourable Woman airs 8:30pm Monday on BBC First.

2 Responses

  1. The best of the BBC First offerings so far.

    Hopefully it isn’t like Blix’s The Shadow Line which started well but turned out to be a silly conspiracy where everyone (police, internal affairs, drug dealers and British Intelligence) was corrupt and killing each other off over drugs imported in tulips from Holland.

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