Review

Tui is missing and a lot of the cops believing the worse are not overly keen on searching for her. Detective Robin Griffin of course thinks she has either drowned, gone bush, or is being held captive by some maniac. She wants to take a DNA sample of every man in the vicinity, determine who the father of Tui's baby is, and bring the full force of the law into the equation. Robin's beliefs are shared to a certainly degree by the psychotic Matt Mitcham who believes that either Tui has gone bush, and will only be found when she wants to be found, or is currently chained to some sick bastards' back wall.

While Matt Mitcham is certainly a suspect suspicion falls on local bar worker Wolfgang Zanic, an immigrant with a paedophile conviction in Auckland. Robin visit's Wolfgang's remote cottage near Eel Creek and discovers Zanic has an arsenal. Zanic escapes into the bush and fires on Robin. She calls for backup from surprisingly ex-boyfriend Johnno, who talks Zanic down. For no apparent reason Robin doesn't arrest Zanic or report his actions, though local Police Chief Al does drop information about Zanic off to Matt Mitcham. Not surprisingly Zanic is later found hung, apparently having left a suicide note.

While the main plotline moves ahead at a glacial pace, this show is more about the backwards nature of the local area and less about solving a mystery, a number of sub plots intertwine themselves into the story adding something or other. Jury still out on what a lot of this means, Campion clearly has a point but some of the characters at this stage seem superfluous to the narrative. For example what has GJ's women's collective got to do with things? Besides GJ seemingly having a messiah like hold over her flock, and I'm not discounting her involvement in Tui's disappearance, the Women thus far have managed to antagonise Matt Mitcham, in this episode one of them paid for sex down the local pub, and a husband showed up with a teenage daughter who clearly has issues. How this all adds to the Tui situation isn't entirely clear though no doubt there is either a thematic meaning to it all or there are further secrets to be revealed.

For sure Jane Campion gets Searchers Search underway in both intense and dramatic fashion, I was in awe of Campion's work here, and no not the world's biggest The Piano fan. Robin Griffin is out in the bush conducting her own search for Tui; apparently someone reported seeing smoke in the area Robin is searching. Campion brings across the isolation, coldness, and primordial nature of the New Zealand bush in stunning fashion. Besides shooting in very direct clinical style Campion uses ambient noise, wind, waves on the lake, and bird song. There's a feeling of menace in the scene that like a lot of New Zealand cinema remains undefined but lurking. Naturally Robin doesn't discover Tui, but she does decide to walk into the lake in a sequence that flashes to Tui's initial aquatic dip. Clearly there's some sort of metaphor here, but hey it went zinging over my head, I was just wondering if there wasn't a local compulsion for chicks to take a depth in the sub zero lake and risk exposure. Anyway stunning and powerful scene that underlines the excellent production values of Top of the Lake and points out Jane Campion isn't about to be rushed in telling the story.

Perhaps the most telling scene in the episode however was Robin escaping to the pub one night as things got a bit hectic on the home front. Robin is confronted with more misogyny than one could expect from a Liberal party caucus meeting but holds her own in the face of what amounts to solid bogan inbred small town mentality. Of course this is diametrically opposed to the Women's collective over in Paradise, though I'm wondering if Jane Campion isn't pointing out both are fundamentally flawed as societies. Anyways Robin comes face to face with small town mentality and the feeling that whatever runs deep, the Lake is a kilometre deep in places Al can inform us, the locals believe it should be kept brooding and festering below the surface. While the scene isn't as brutal as say the egg scene in Once Were Warriors there's still a feeling of violence being not that far from the surface if Robin probes where she shouldn't.

I got a further feeling of being "on the edge of civilisation" in the barroom scene where Matt Mitcham laid it all down for the locals. He pretty much trivialised the police efforts to find Tui and warned of consequences if he or his lads discovered someone was holding Tui. You get the feeling that either a major confrontation is brewing or Campion is pointing out Robin is on a hiding to nothing in trying to leverage any sort of a result given the local isolation and inward view points. Clearly Zanic's suicide is somewhat strange, can we expect another shoddy bit of Police investigation or will something more tangible result?

With Tui's disappearance being the primary reason for Robin's continued involvement in local affairs she naturally gets a search warrant for the Mitcham compound and with no manoeuvring room Al agrees to accompany her to conduct the search. Surprisingly they are given access all areas, though Al is quick to search the sheds leaving Robin to search the actual house, an A frame construct that sort of does a TARDIS, it's bigger on the inside. Neither Police officer discovers anything; Al clearly is just going through the motions while Robin misses what is literally right below her feet. Further secrets to be discovered no doubt as the miniseries unfolds, but I'm pretty sure we won't find Tui on the Mitcham property.

Yes there is a kind of recurrent theme to this review, Top of the Lake is swimming in mystery with a lot of people having things they don't want out in the open. Not sure Campion can hold this all together without starting to give away some answers and start putting the apparent divergent pieces into something of a logical pattern.

Top of the Lake is unfolding in stunning fashion but don't expect explosive scenes of kinetic action, car chases, or things blowing up. Jane Campion is revealing her story at a slow pace but is building quite the atmosphere; I'm not expecting fluffy bunnies by the end of episode seven. This series is all about tension and atmosphere, well worth a look as it's not your typical crime drama. Jane Campion has a whole lot more happening that one would expect, the waters sure do run deep.