Killing Time
Disgraced lawyer Andrew Fraser (David Wenham)
rose to power defending some of Australia’s biggest criminals
until he was sent to a maximum security prison for 5 years. This 10 part
Australian True Crime series follows Fraser’s ruthless rise and ultimate
fall from power.
Due
to the overwhelming additional channels added to free to air television,
Foxtel (Australia’s biggest cable company) has begun a huge intake of
local productions to boost its exclusive content and ensure its
subscribers don’t vacate the company. Dishing out shows like Slide,
Cloud Street; Killing Time fits perfectly on a cable network, due to
overwhelming and confronting violence, nudity and no holds bar
language.
Shot with such a degree of realism the streets of Melbourne have never
looked so threatening. Killing Time comes off as an Underbelly rip-off;
however it’s far from it. The story comes from Blue Murder writer Ian
David so you know right off the bat that you have one of Australia’s
best true crime writers; couple that with the great director Peter
Andrikidis who is arguably one of the best television directors
Australian has to offer you get one of the best True Crime dramas to hit
our screens.
David Wenham plays Fraser superbly, an actor of this calibre is
something that can be hard to find on our shores because of the lack of
local productions causing most of our top actors to ship off to the
United States. Wenham has such a serious tone that you are drawn to
Fraser’s story and even at times being excited for Fraser and his
success. The series is told over two corresponding stories Fraser’s rise
to power as one of Melbourne’s most exclusive solicitors, dealing with
only the highest profile criminals like Dennis Allen played brilliantly
by Richard Cawthorne and Lewis Moran (Colin Friels) to his ultimate
demise and being incarcerated into a maximum security prison for 5
years. While the show does deal with elements that are of course a major
part of the original Underbelly series the show is something of a higher
calibre.
The
show has taken some time to hit the screens and was originally set to be
14 episodes however due to the ongoing court case with some of the
criminals depicted in the show the series has been split up into 2 parts
and while the series finale does have an ending that satisfies most you
can’t help but want more and you can look forward to the final part of
the series due out hopefully by the end of 2013.
The
DVD release is perfectly snatched off the screen, at times looking
better than what cable could offer. Other than the feature the DVD comes
with a one off interview with the real Andrew Fraser with Andrew Denton
on Enough Rope. This is a very compelling interview and as usual Denton
really does ask the hard hitting questions.
This is with no doubt one of the best things to come out of Australia
either on TV or on the big screen. You won’t be disappointed.
