Casting The First Stone:Without Sin.

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone" is a saying, vaguely attributed to Jesus, we're all familiar with - and we all understand what it means. But while we all sin, or at least err, some sins, quite clearly, are worse than others. Murder for example. Not least the murder of a teenage girl.

In Without Sin (ITVX, written and created by Frances Poletti, directed by Al Mackay), Vicky McClure plays Stella, a Nottinghamshire taxi driver, rarely seen without a woolly hat, whose fourteen year old daughter Maisy (Justine Moore) has been murdered. Stella, understandably, has struggled to come to terms with it even though Charles Stone (Johnny Harris) has pleaded guilty, and gone to prison, for the crime.

When it's suggested, by Restorative Justice Mediator Bobbi Carter (Andrea Lowe), that Stella meet Charles in prison (not so she can forgive him but so she can gain some closure), she reluctantly agrees. The meeting does not go to plan. Charles says that, despite his confession, he is not guilty of the murder, that he's been framed, and even that another girl, Cleo Dale (Elise Ackerman) is in serious danger from those set him up.

 

After a look on the Internet, Stella starts to think there may be something to Charles's story but this brings her in to tense conversations and arguments with her family and friends. She seems to already enjoy a lukewarm relationship with her mother Jessie (Dorothy Atkinson) and even frostier one with Jessie's new partner Kelvin (Ezra Faroque Khan).

Stella and her ex-husband, Maisy's father, Paul (Perry Fitzpatrick) is now in a relationship with Meera (Krupa Pattani) and they're expecting their first child and even her close police officer friend Remy (Johann Myers), despite being forever loyal - possibly with his own motives, warns her she needs to bring to end what has become a crusade to both save Cleo and to find out what really happened to Maisy.

 

As Stella drives around in her taxi at night, meets with various people who she believes can help her solve the mystery, and constantly puts herself in what appears to be mortal danger, Without Sin opens up to become a tense, captivating thriller that touches on themes of parental responsibility, infidelity, drug abuse, and, in the form of the McKeller family (Con O'Neil plays Roman, Harvey Scrimshaw his wayward son Lee), some very serious criminal activity.

I wasn't sure until very near the end exactly how it would all play out and if, at times, it felt a little bit far fetched that didn't really matter. McClure was great as Stella, Harris good as Charles, and the rest of the cast (props to Kieran Burton as Charles's son Teddy and Callum Fuller as Charles's cellmate Jamal) admirably backed them up. It was violent (in places), and it was dark (most of it appeared to be set at night!) but, most of all, it was addictive.