‘Save Me’ DVD Review
Fans of The Walking Dead will be used to Lennie James each week, giving a stand out performance as Morgan. But between his time in The Walking Dead and Fear the Walking Dead, he has also found time to film a British thriller called Save Me, giving a performance that truly shows how good an actor he is.
When a young girl, Jody, goes missing, her last message to her mother is that she is going to see her father, and not to worry. When Nelly (Lennie James) is arrested by the police over her abduction, he has no knowledge of her whereabouts.
Save Me is a story that isn’t afraid to get dark, and for some it can be quite hard to watch. What it also is though is the story of a man who must first take a look at himself and the consequences of his selfish actions before he can become a better person, and one who can save his own daughter.
When we first meet Nelly, he lives off the women who are gullible enough to fall for his stories. A bully, what he says goes, and even in his local pub he lays down the law-making enemies of those around him. It is made clear that we aren’t meant to like the man he is now, and that he has a lot of work to do to redeem himself.
The abduction of his daughter, apparently by somebody who knows him well enough to be able to pretend to be him is an eye-opening not only for him but the people around him. He loses control of everything, but in having this happen, it also frees him up to have the ability to not only investigate who took his daughter, but to also realise who his real friends are.
It is interesting that we should feel more pity for Claire, Jody’s mother, but her life isn’t as clean-cut as it would first appear either. Living a seemingly perfect life at face value, we learn that it is far from that. This is why as the story progresses and Nelly changes for the better, she becomes closer to him.
The story of Jody is one that is dark, and often stomach churning because of the subject matter. The show is very effective at conveying the danger that Jody is in, although we never get to experience it. We see things though that hint at what she could be going through and it is the unknown that hits hard.
What Save Me does well is to create a community around Lenny, and one that Claire once belonged to. At the start of the story many in the community despise Lenny for what he is, but by the end we see them come closer together to help him, and to deal with the issue that is part of their everyday lives. When it matters, they come together and that is what is important.
With stellar performances from Lennie James, Suranne Jones, Stephen Graham, and Jason Flemyng, and many others Save Me is a British show that shows off just what talent we have, and how good they really are. Dark and harrowing, Save Me is a show that hits the audience hard right where it needs to. You won’t be forgetting this one for quite some time.
***** 5/5
Save Me is available on DVD in the UK now.
