County Lines

I was set a challenge by a so called friend to find the bleakest film ever made. Will our friendship survive this torture? Well I've found it .... The bleakest film of all time. County Lines 2019 BBCIPlayer . It probably hits a nerve because those are the kids and families that I've been living within my neighbourhood and I've watched due to lack of funding and government drive with ever decreasing levels of success over the years spiral further down into poverty .

Desperate times calls for desperate measures.

County Lines is the term used for drug runners working in other cities or rural areas away from their own home patch, principally because they have no police record in that area and because they are young kids. Great acting from all the cast, all unknowns apart from one lad who is now in Eastenders. It's a simple but very real story, 9/10 (thinking about it THE ROAD is the bleakest movie if all time)

If you're not in the know about drug trafficking parlance, then the title won't mean much - but that's not so important as we get to know "Tyler" (Conrad Khan). He lives with his drop-out mum "Toni" (Ashley Madekwe) and young sister. His school life is pretty torrid and despite efforts from the teachers and his mother to help, he remains introspective and prone to violence. Then he meets "Simon" (Harris Dickinson). He's a chavvy sort of guy, black Mercedes and plenty of cash to splash - and he doesn't overtly try to recruit the young "Tyler". He waits patiently for him to come to him - and that's when the spiral begins. He can make easy money by shipping narcotics from the city to the more rural punters where supply is more limited and more lucrative. What "Tyler" doesn't realise is, though, he's just a pawn in a game - and "Simon" is using loads of other lads like him to keep him in clover. It's the increasingly stark realisation that his choices are going to leave him battered, high and dry that gets us to a denouement that is predicable, but quite potent. Dickinson does quite well as the charmingly malevolent pusher with a big smile and a ruthless streak a mile wide, Madekwe also performs strongly as the mother who must get her act together to protect what is her's - but essentially this is a story about a young man with little hope and a hell of a lot of frustrations and Khan plays that role assuredly. At times the audio mix isn't the best and coupled with their dark and dingy flat can make the film a little difficult to follow at the start, but those same filming techniques also contribute to the general bleakness of the plot.

Remarkable acting, script and life story. Would have been a 10/10 if it had not been for the peculiar old-fashioned screen dimensions, which made it look more like a 80s TV movie than a modern widescreen film.

The way in which Tyler is recruited into the County Lines drug dealing network, becoming the 'Jim Line' is both convincing and disturbing. The film shows the social problems that lie behind the recruitment of youngsters into these criminal schemes, even the school life is shown -- and I have to say I would not want to be a teacher in that school. There's a lack of explanation of certain things. I'm not sure a US viewer would know that a PRU is a pupil referral unit.

Delicately poignant. Toe-curling in moments, hands over eyes in others, grounded but nothing short of absolutely gripping. You were right there with them, all the time, which is a testament to the script and the cast.

Khan was phenomenal and gave outstanding performances throughout. This is completely moving and an ode to British filmmaking. The atmosphere built through the expressionist and nuanced cinematography was seriously next level and it's how it's been filmed that makes the picture so evocative.

That cold, bleak hue and fuzzy grain of a winter in working England is something I know strikes many of us watching. The complex interpersonal nature of family and our parents during adolescence. The nativity of youth and the regret and sorrow we so often feel. Craving that deep hug from a maternal figure, crying into their arms.

County Lines is a truly beautiful and timeless piece by Blake; a necessary work of catharsis, melancholy, bravery and poignancy.

All my life I've heard people say "They were asking for it--" regarding nearly every imaginable kind of hardship folks see others facing (including rape). Easy to be smug at your own puny achievements when you observe the calamities of others, but tomorrow you might be hit by a bus as you digit the nth tweet of the morning. Today's "culture" is so sick it's a miracle the lights are still on. As with the storyline here in "County Lines", life itself has become one endless turf war, digging private trenches, mostly invisible: your kids my kids, your stuff my stuff. And then the banality of ordinary evil, the sudden event that re-ignites neglected bonds (married couples, parents with their kids, former friends). We make mistakes, briefly show remorse, but then invariably lapse back into our old ways of utter self-interest. True renewal is an extreme accomplishment. The heroes here in "County Lines" are perhaps not the mother (albeit commendable), but the other adults around Tyler of no blood relation who invest in him: his teachers and the social worker, those silent and mainly invisible individuals who hold the rich and complex tapestry of our society together. This restrained yet subtly ambitious film belongs with Ken Loach's "Sweet Sixteen", Andrea Arnold's "Fish Tank", and not least Clio Barnard's "Selfish Giant". Thanks to a wonderful cast, and thanks to you Mr Blake for bringing them together.