In theory, I should’ve relished creator Lucy Coleman and director Bonnie Moir’s Sydney-set mystery series from the start, with its sophisticated performances, multi-dimensional characters, and considered approaches to challenging subjects such as violence against women. Coleman (who wrote the screenplay) and Moir avoid many traps lesser productions fall into, from too-neat dialogue to trope-shackled writing.
But it took me a long time — about four of the six episodes — to feel truly immersed; I wonder how long most viewers will last. The decision to separate Exposure into roughly 30 minutes was an odd choice for this Stan original series, given it’s a format better suited to snappier shows that require less investment.
The show charts the emotionally turbulent journey of Alice Englert’s Jacs, a 27-year-old photographer determined to unearth details around the death by suicide of her best friend, Kel (Mia Artemis).
The drama is quite naturalistic, with a vérité tang, which isn’t something typically seen in what is, in essence, a genre piece. It’s nothing as simple as a whodunnit, but there is a mystery at the heart of it: Jacs believes a mystery person, saved in Kel’s phone under the name “DO NOT MESSAGE”, may have played some role in her death. There have been missed calls, deleted messages and two more still there: “This should never have happened” and “I never meant to hurt you.”
The show is quick to establish Jacs as a talented, if troubled creative: one of its earliest scenes sees her accepting a photography award and giving a half arsed, inebriated speech before cutting herself short and walking off prematurely. She’s the kind of character who tend to get called “complex”. Another, more Whitmanesque way to describe Jacs: she contains multitudes. Sometimes in ways that are quite troubling – for instance, her award-winning photograph was a picture of Kel’s corpse – but Englert (the daughter of Jane Campion) impresses from the start in this difficult role, bringing enough of Jacs’ pain to the surface to resonate, while keeping much of it bottled up, banks of darkness swelling deep down. She’s loud and unapologetic; she loves and hates; she makes mistakes; she reaches for air like a drowning person; she pulls others down with her.
Engert’s face, a paradoxical blend of obstinate and overwhelmed, is the heart and soul of the show. Other cast members impress, including the ever-reliable Essie Davis as Jacs’ mother Kathy.
But the pacing in this series is a little off, with an airiness that loosens some of the key dramatic pivots. Coleman’s script avoids going over these with highlighter pen, which of course isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it does engender a circular momentum that sometimes extracts the pith from the drama, loosening its impact. And for a show that takes a very circuitous route to reveal things, it felt odd to see a core element ultimately revealed very explicitly, through actual recorded vision of the event. Which is always a hard thing to do without it feeling narratively convenient.
There’s a lot to appreciate here, nevertheless. Coleman also wrote and directed the under-appreciated Australian comedy film Hot Mess, and Moir directed the second season of the excellent Melbourne-set drama Love Me. They are both exciting talents to watch.
Exposure starts on Stan on 20 June
In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counselor. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org
