Daisy Edgar Jones stars as the leading role in this blend of a courtroom/family drama. Daisy’s character ‘Kya’ becomes the centre of attention in her closed-minded little town after a man she was involved with dies under mysterious circumstances. The film unfolds in flashbacks as Kya’s life plays out alongside the murder she is accused of. Her family abandoned her early on, so Kya quickly learns to fend for herself within the marshland, she finds temporary comfort with very few characters as she is still viewed as an outsider within the community. This idea of the ‘outsider’ becomes of the main plot points in the courtroom drama.
Despite depicting a fairly well written and beautifully filmed story about the burdens of coming from a broken home and being constantly seen as an outsider, the plot is cliched and dull. The two parental roles for Kya: ‘Jumpin’ and ‘Mabel’ support and care for Kya as if they raised her which is a heart-warming relationship to see but it is easy to compare this role to the ‘Mammy’ role in which the black character is forced to raise a white child as their own without much of the film focussing on the lives of the black people performing this emotional labour. Kya faces constant struggle in her life and there are brief moments within the film that exemplify the hardships of domestic abuse and overcoming those in your life who should love you but physically and emotionally hurt you instead. That being said, the plot is still lacking, and the ending is painfully easy to see from a mile away. The message of the film is weak and does not linger in the mind for long after leaving the cinema. It would be lovely to see Daisy Edgar Jones in a role that does not involve emotionally unstable men making her life hard. Hopefully Hollywood will recognise her talent as more than a manic pixie dream girl.