Five Days (2007– )

A five-part miniseries that revolves around the disappearance of a young mother in a quiet British suburb and the circumstances that leave her children abandoned far from home.

Stars:

Shaun Dooley, Steve Evets, Shivani Ghai

Nominated for 1 Golden Globe. Another 1 win & 12 nominations.

Cast

Series cast summary:
Shaun Dooley	...	Sgt. Parker (5 episodes, 2010)
Steve Evets	...	Pat Dowling (5 episodes, 2010)
Shivani Ghai	...	Nusrat Preston (5 episodes, 2010)
Bernard Hill	...	Gerard Hopkirk (5 episodes, 2010)
Suranne Jones	...	DC Laurie Franklin (5 episodes, 2010)
Matthew McNulty	...	Danny Preston (5 episodes, 2010)
Aaron Neil	...	Ibra Akram (5 episodes, 2010)
Anne Reid	...	Jen Mason (5 episodes, 2010)
Derek Riddell	...	Nick Durden (5 episodes, 2010)
Samantha Robinson	...	Natalie Cryer (5 episodes, 2010)
Nina Sosanya	...	Colly Trent (5 episodes, 2010)
Sarah Smart	...	Sarah Wheeler (4 episodes, 2007)
Michelle Bonnard	...	Defne 'Tops' Topcu (4 episodes, 2007)
Penelope Wilton	...	Barbara Poole (4 episodes, 2007)
Patrick Malahide	...	John Poole (4 episodes, 2007)
Edward Woodward	...	Victor Marsham (4 episodes, 2007)
David Oyelowo	...	Matt Wellings (4 episodes, 2007)
Rory Kinnear	...	Kyle Betts (4 episodes, 2007)
Nikki Amuka-Bird	...	PC Simone Farnes (4 episodes, 2007)
Hugh Bonneville	...	DSI Iain Barclay (4 episodes, 2007)
Charlie Creed-Miles	...	DC Stephen Beam (4 episodes, 2007)
Janet McTeer	...	DS Amy Foster (4 episodes, 2007)
Sacha Dhawan	...	Khalil (4 episodes, 2010)
Cornell John	...	Didi Mputu (4 episodes, 2010)
David Morrissey	...	DI Mal Craig (4 episodes, 2010)
Zaid Munir	...	Sohel Hussain (4 episodes, 2010)
Pooky Quesnel	...	Maureen Hardy (4 episodes, 2010)
Hugo Speer	...	Supt Jim Carpenter (4 episodes, 2010)
Ashley Walters	...	Jamal Matthews (4 episodes, 2010)
Lee Massey	...	Ethan Wellings (3 episodes, 2007)
Tyler Anthony	...	Rosie Wellings (3 episodes, 2007)
Lucinda Dryzek	...	Tanya Wellings (3 episodes, 2007)
Margot Leicester	...	Hazel Betts (3 episodes, 2007)
Jason Watkins	...	Francis Cross (3 episodes, 2007)
Doug Allen	...	Gary Machin (3 episodes, 2007)
Joanna Horton	...	Danielle Miller (3 episodes, 2007)
Philip Arditti	...	Dr Haydar (3 episodes, 2010)
Kerry Condon	...	Siobhan Doole (3 episodes, 2010)
Chris Fountain	...	PC Paul Tait (3 episodes, 2010)
Kamal Kaan	...	Farid Sardar (3 episodes, 2010)
Ash Tandon	...	Mr. Hassan (2 episodes, 2010)
Caroline Martin	...	Emma Opie (2 episodes, 2007)
Christopher Fairbank	...	DS Curling (2 episodes, 2007)
Patrick O'Kane	...	DI Laverty (2 episodes, 2007)
Lauren Taylor	...	Stylist (2 episodes, 2007)
Al Weaver	...	Josh Fairley (2 episodes, 2007)
Nichola Dame Hartwell	...	Older Stylist (2 episodes, 2007)
Ruth Gemmell	...	Dr. Tobolska (2 episodes, 2007)
Richard Harrington	...	Daf Parry (2 episodes, 2007)
San Shella	...	DC Nawaz (2 episodes, 2007)
Vincent Franklin	...	Rawdon Hull (2 episodes, 2007)
Philip Davis	...	Mic Danes (2 episodes, 2007)
Harriet Walter	...	ACC Jenny Griffin (2 episodes, 2007)
Navin Chowdhry	...	Bilal Choudry (2 episodes, 2010)

Storyline

The story begins one hot summers day when Leanne Wellings is taking her two young children to visit her grandfather. She stops to buy flowers at a motorway lay-by but then inexplicably vanishes -- leaving her two small children waiting for her in her car -- lost and far from home. Her two small children then set off to find her only to go missing themselves. Their ordeal is captured on CCTV cameras and before long the family's heart-stopping trauma is not only a complex police investigation but a major national news story.

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Plot Keywords:

children | disappearance | police | missing | investigation | 

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Taglines:

Nothing is what it seems...

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Genres:

Drama | Crime | Mystery | Thriller

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Details

Official Sites:

BBC [uk]

Country:

UK

Language:

English

Release Date:

2 October 2007 (USA)

Also Known As:

Cinco días

Filming Locations:

Hertfordshire, England, UK

Company Credits

Production Co:

British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), Home Box Office (HBO)

Technical Specs

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.78 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

A few scenes, including the ending, are being re-shot for the US release.

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Goofs

In the scene where Hugh Bonneville checks out the VW transporter van, the production office vehicle and livery, plus the silver Mercedes sound van and sound engineer are clearly visible.

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Connections

Spin-off Hunter (2009)

User Reviews

Five Hours

This is a very engrossing BBC-TV mini-series which is loosely based upon a mysterious disappearance of a young mother, but the series is really more of a study of the assorted characters in the story, which lasts for five hours. It is thus very much an ensemble piece, where the wide variety of brilliant British actors and actresses can show off their talents. The actual characters portrayed are really 'the kind of people one does not normally meet', people so boring and nondescript that it is difficult to admire them. For instance, the lead character is a young husband (the one whose wife disappears) who has no job and no apparent interest in finding any. He lives off handouts from his parents-in-law. He was once in the Army but does not appear to have the slightest flicker of any ambition or any interests in life apart from doting on his small family. He is played by David Oyelowo, who is brilliant at the part, coming across as a totally sympathetic person, although his only activities for five hours are loving and grieving, which he does superbly, so that one wants to comfort him, as he is so obviously a nice guy. The standout performance of the whole series is unquestionably Penelope Wilton, who acts circles round everyone else in the story. She is simply incredible. She portrays a very unsympathetic woman, indeed the only character in the story who is all too familiar to everyone, namely an irrational, hysterical, self-centred, dense, querulous, blindly loving and blindly hating, elderly idiot-woman. Alas, alas, we know them too well. Wilton is one of Britain's finest actresses (see my review of her in 'Half Broken Things'). She takes a character who could have been two-dimensional and makes her four-dimensional. She is wonderfully supported by old pro Patrick Malahide, who plays her exasperated husband, and the pair of them set a high standard indeed for all the younger players. Janet McTeer, a spectacular actress when younger, has become a much less sympathetic type of person now that she is older, has coarsened in some way, and puts one off, but she redeems herself in the latter stages of the story by showing how brilliant an actress she can be when she has a chance by pulling off one of the most convincing and original drunk scenes I have ever seen on film. The big surprise is the enigmatic character Sarah, played with great depth and originality by actress Sarah Smart. She takes a character who could have been insufferably tedious and by sheer acting magic turns her into a deeply mysterious and intriguing person, about whom we wonder tirelessly for the entire five hours. She is so good at it that we end up wondering about Sarah Smart, frankly. I guess that's what happens when you really do your job properly, that people wonder where the character ends and the actress begins, if she knows herself, that is, and many do not. She has some deeply unnerving tricks with her eyes, which wobble and let us know she is unhinged, but we are not sure how or why, though we eventually learn that she had an extremely violent and traumatic childhood. Her mastery of ambiguous facial expressions is extraordinary. Rory Kinnear is amazingly convincing as an apparently hopeless fellow who lives with his mum and isn't up to much, but who turns out to have hidden depths. (I suppose most people have hidden depths, but do we want to plumb them, that is the question.) His mum is played very well indeed by Margot Leicester. A superb performance is given by Lucinda Dryzek, who plays a snotty, revolting teenage girl of the sort we all dread to meet, but who at crucial moments collapses in helpless tears and turns out to be pathetic, with all her arrogance just a pose. Three other children are also very good, Lucinda's friend, and her younger half-brother and half-sister. The younger siblings may be very dim indeed as characters in the story (they seem unable to say anything particularly articulate, being hopeless witnesses to the disappearance), with little to recommend them but their sweet natures, but that is conveyed to wonderful effect by Lee Massey as the boy and Tyler Anthony as the girl. Harriet Walter has a small role, but we do not get to see much of her, which is a shame, as she is such a fine actress that she was wasted here. One could go on, but one must draw a line somewhere. The series manages to be strangely fascinating because of the depth of portrayal of all these essentially uninteresting people caught up in a web of intense anxiety and suspense.