Underplayed Gems
The whole movie catalogue

Films and series, searchable by what they are

← Back to the shop

Frontiers (1996)

Frontiers poster
Country
United Kingdom
Length
1 season, 1 episode
Rating
9.0 of 10 from 1 voters
Elsewhere
IMDb

How it feels

This crime drama series follows two rival police chiefs and their teams in a Special Crime Squad. They clash over territory and methods in a London setting.

tensegrittyangrydatedformulaicmelodramaticstylizeddark

What happens

Frontiers is an ITV television crime drama series was produced by Carlton Television, broadcast between 7 May and 25 June 1996. The series, created by acclaimed writer Stephen Poliakoff, focuses on the rivalry between two rival police chiefs of the Special Crime Squad and their respective teams of officers. Co-written with Sam Donovan and Sandy Welch, only a single series of six episodes was broadcast, as despite a high-profile cast, including Kevin McNally, Clare Holman, Hywel Bennett and Philip Glenister, the series failed to impact audiences and was quickly axed. Amelia Bullmore, Fay Ripley and singer Sophie Ellis-Bextor also appeared in the series. Thomas Sutcliffe of The Independent said of the series; "Stephen Poliakoff is noted as a Special Adviser to Frontiers. Stephen Poliakoff, the respected playwright, that is. This is inexplicable, unless they have simply ignored his advice, because Frontiers is the apotheosis of the Angry Shouting Copper show, a mail-order catalogue for every exhausted cliché of the genre – from the lazily rotating extractor fan which casts such a gothic light, to the stand-up rows in gloomy corridors. "Screw up on my territory again, and I'll make sure you're not in charge of a whelk stall before I'm finished with you." (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

More like this

This page is from Underplayed Gems. Not quite it? Tell the Catbot what you feel like watching and it picks from the whole catalogue, or browse by genre, country and year.

Lists: Korean thrillers worth the evening · Anime films beyond Studio Ghibli · Slow films for a rainy night · Horror that unsettles instead of startling · Series you can finish in a weekend · Nordic crime worth the subtitles · Good films that end in under 90 minutes · Documentaries that play like thrillers

Loading movies…

What should I watch?