Ones To Watch: Top Of The Lake

A new eight episode miniseries from Jane Campion, Top Of The Lake, comes to BBC2 this summer.  The series, set in New Zealand, follows a detective, played by Mad Men‘s Elisabeth Moss, drafted in to investigate the disappearance of a 12 year old pregnant girl. THN have had a sneek peek at the first episode ahead of tonight’s airing and here’s what we thought.

It’s been likened to Scandanavian drama series The Killing thanks to it’s female-led investigation that dominates the story-line but Top Of The Lake is more interested in the mystery of this town and it’s population than the crime itself.  The premise of the crime; a 12 year old girl, played laconically but with an intense sense of sadness by newly discovered Jacqueline Joe, goes missing after it comes to light she is five months pregnant and was found trying to do herself some serious harm in the town’s mysteriously poisonous lake.

Brought in to uncover exactly what has happened to Tui is detective Robin (Elisabeth Moss) who happens to be in town visiting her dying mother.  Despite a not-quite-there New Zealand accent Moss is genuine and portrays her role with the level of depth you would hope for.  The character appears to be hiding some dark secrets of her own and no doubt those will be brought to light throughout the investigation hopefully building up to some dramatic Elisabeth Moss reveal scenes.

Also in the cast line up are Peter Mullan as Tui’s slightly unhinged father, who may or may not have something to do with her disappearance so the first episode hints, and Holly Hunter who is almost unrecognizable as the guru leader of a group of damaged women who set up a camp in the town.

What impressed about Top Of The Lake, aside from a genuinely intriguing plot and good performances, is the backdrop Campion has set this story against.  The vastness of the scenic New Zealand towns of Queenstown and Glenorchy, where filming took place, and the beauty of the landscape is captured in all it’s glory by Campion and her co-creator Gerard Lee.  Campion showed she could do sweeping landscape and the great outdoors in her last project, 2009’s BRIGHT STAR, and her familiarity with New Zealand being a native only serves to add the impressive cinematography showcased here.

Top Of The Lake starts tonight at 9.10pm on BBC2.