Lollipop

"There is something quite visceral about the performance from Posy Sterling in this. She’s “Molly”, a single parent with two young children. Her problem is that upon her release she has no job, no money and nowhere to live and so social services are not about to let the youngsters go and live with their mum - however much they all want to. She doesn’t do herself any favours when she absconds with the kids after a supervised visit, but could her reacquaintance with old pal “Amina” (Idil Ahmed) help stabilise her erratic behaviour before the children are permanently assigned elsewhere for their own well-being? Now, though Sterling’s acting is powerful, some of the rest of this seems a little contrived to maximise it's dramatic effect and there are no men at all, in any role. We don’t know why she was in jail, there are references to an history of domestic abuse but with a character we never meet, and whilst the kids turn in decent performances, neither they nor Ahmed are especially natural on the few occasions we meet them. To be fair, it does try to show that the council officials are trying to act in the best interests of the children, so this isn’t just an hatchet job on under-resourced officialdom, but I thought this too much about one very strong, and not always stable, personality portrayal rather than a substantial critique on an heart-rending scenario. It’s worth a watch, but it has plenty of flaws."