Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Matt Smith, Sarah Greene, Rafael Mathé, Johann Myers, Robert Glenister, Patrick Carswell, Alice Feetham, Ed Eales White, Lindsay Duncan, Francis Tomelty, Lydia Hunt, Bobby Rainsbury, Andrea Valls, Laura Doddington, Nick Cave, David Threlfall.

The Death Of Bunny Munro is arguably to be seen as a surreal exercise of indulgence that should not work, and yet it is a captivating sense of movement that details the length that some people will go to provide glorious colour to their own car crash of a life.

Viewers of a certain age will find themselves thinking of a certain ‘Confessions’ series of films that littered cinema in a period when such storylines were not only permitted beyond tolerance, but were a staple of the experience of an evening out for many. It is to the deliberate nature of the sepia tones of the sex addict that gives the six part series its early dynamic, its essence gives it a feel of the noir, dreamlike/nightmare enthused, and in the end what could have been seen as a saucy romp along the south coast’s middle-aged women for the protagonist is an off kilter judgement against Bunny Munro himself as he and his son deal with the fall out of excess, image, and suicide.

It is in that distraction of a Lothario that finally realises his life has been a tangled mess of insecurity and emotionless drive, set against the knowledge that comes with death that he is the cause of his own empty despair that gives what could have been a hostile part an element of satisfaction in the performance by Matt Smith as the titular character.

The actor has made a name for himself as embracing the surreal nature of charm and charisma, an individual to whom the spark of life is without fear, but also one to whom the viewer can rely upon to send a shiver of the near deranged, embracing the near insanity within the human mind, and as the scenes shot with the terrific David Threlfall, in excellent form as Bunny’s father, testify, the madness of his life is showcased in the fear of crossing his dad, but also deferring, defending, him without explicit testimony.

With powerful performances, albeit in short random vignette-like structures, from the likes of Johann Myers, Robert Glenister and Laura Doddington, as well as a perfectly venomous driven and understandably grief-stricken execution of presentation by Lindsay Duncan as the mother of Bunny’s dead wife, The Death Of Bunny Munro eagerly shows the depth of a fall a person can take, especially when aided by a collection of souls who love them to death.

Attention-grabbing from the start, engrossed in its own fierceness and willing to pull the viewer into its own noir like sordid exposure, The Death Of Bunny Munro is a series that transcends its objective to shock a society that has drowned out the noise of what is obviously unexpected in the modern age.

Ian D. Hall