This is a riveting political and sexual drama about a “perfect” upper class British marriage of two Oxford graduates (played by Sienna Miller and Rupert Friend) that slowly comes apart under the pressure of a cheating scandal involving the husband, a popular and rising Tory minister in the British government.
As the minister’s affair first hits the tabloids, it looks like the usual guilty politician's playbook unfolding, with sad and "honest" confessions to the wife, public apologies, and professional PR assistance in trying to ride out the rough parts and get back to business as usual. That strategy all starts to come unglued, though, when the young paramour and minister's aide brings rape charges against the minister, revolving around whether she had given consent to a post-affair sexual encounter.
Michelle Dockery stars as the prosecutor who brings the rape case against the minister, with a hidden agenda and secrets of her own. Throughout the unfolding story, new issues and mysteries keep appearing about other dark personal secrets in the lives of the minister and his wife, dating back to their shared Oxford days, and the social activities of the husband and his close friend, who is now the Prime Minister, when they were both members of a campus club of rich bad boys called “the Libertines”.
This excellent mini-series combines several hidden crimes and mystery plots, a fine legal courtroom drama, a story of a seemingly happy marriage under the pressure of cheating and betrayals, a familiar portrayal of the extent to which political power, privilege and wealth can protect people from the consequences of their crimes and bad acts, and a thought-provoking exploration of the difficulties of identifying and proving consent to sex on the part of the woman, in the context of ongoing sexual relationships and unplanned moments of passion. Highly recommended.
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