It would have been some coup for the BBC and Amazon Prime to land director Steve McQueen for just one TV movie.
However, landing him for five is just mind blowing.
The Turner Prize winner and acclaimed director of 'Hunger,' 'Shame' 'Twelve Years A Slave' and 'Widows' is one of the finest filmmakers of his generation.
Not only has he brought compelling and morally complex movies to the big screen but he has consistently shown a willingness to push the boundaries of visual storytelling in his work.
But he also draws out exceptional performances from his casts - especially from the likes of Michael Fassbender, Liam Cunningham, Stuart Graham, Carey Mulligan, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Lupita N'Yongo, Paul Dano, Viola Davis, Elizabeth Debicki and Daniel Kaluuya.
McQueen has directed five one-off films for the BBC and Amazon Prime, banded together in an anthology known as 'Small Axe' - a reference to the Bob Marley song of the same name containing the proverb: "If you are the big tree, then we are the small axe".
In gestation for six years, the brief McQueen gave himself was to redress the imbalance in British television drama by creating a series of one-off dramas that honestly explored the experience of black people in his homeland.
"I just felt that in terms of television drama we are still missing," McQueen recently told The Guardian.
"We are missing from the conversation. We are missing from the narrative.
"And to me that is weird. Not to see yourself or any aspects of ordinary life that reflect your experiences of growing up in Britain, that is just plain weird."
His first film in the series concentrates on the trial of the Mangrove Nine.
In 1970, nine black activists, including the future broadcaster Darcus Howe, were charged with incitement to riot following disturbances that erupted during a protest against a series of police raids on the Mangrove Restaurant, a hub for the Carribbean community in Notting Hill.
Initially, the charges against Howe, Barbara Beese, Rupert Boyce, Rhodan Gordon, Anthony Innis, Altheia Jones-Le Cointe, Rothwell Kentish, Godfrey Millett and the Mangrove Restaurant's owner Frank Crichlow were dismissed by a Magistrate.
However the Director of Public Prosecutions reinstated the charges and they were tried at the Old Bailey.
The resultant court case was extraordinary, with Howe and Jones Le-Cointe opting to defend themselves and the defence arguing the trial should be heard by an all black jury on the basis that the Magna Carta guaranteed defendants would be tried by their peers.
McQueen and his co-screenwriter Alastair Siddons also show the events that built up to the trial, with the Mangrove opening its doors in 1968 against the backdrop of then Conservative MP, Enoch Powell's infamous "Rivers of Blood" speech that saw him rail against immigration and the proposed Race Relations Bill.
At the start of the film, Shaun Parkes' Frank Crichlow wanders through West London streets and wasteland, passing graffiti praising Powell.
We see a joyous celebration in the restaurant, with the camera shimmying out the door behind Crichlow and his patrons as they dance to the sound of steel drums.
But it isn't long until Crichlow is feeling the heat from Sam Spruell's bigoted PC Pulley who seems determined to destroy the Mangrove by alleging it is a den of illegal gambling, prostitution and drug dealing.
Pulley tells his fellow police officers as they observe the comings and goings at the Mangrove that black men "need to know their place..just like the Micks".
And in one shocking sequence, Joseph Quinn's new recruit PC Dixon is told during a card game by Thomas Coombes' PC Royce that he has to go out and arrest any black man he finds on the street because he has just played the ace of spades.
Arresting random black men after playing the card is a tradition in the station and a young man is indeed scooped off the streets and taken to police cells - his groceries strewn across the street.
As Pulley keeps the Mangrove under surveillance and regular raids are carried out on it, Crichlow becomes increasingly frustrated at the failure of the Metropolitan Police and others in authority to take his allegations of harassment seriously.
The police's focus on the Mangrove attracts the attention of the fledgling Black Panther movement in Britain.
Letitia Wright's Altheia Jones-Le Cointe and Malachi Kirby's Darcus Howe take up the cause, while Crichlow becomes increasingly disillusioned - even offering to throw it in the pot during while gambling.
However, he is constantly told the Mangrove is far too important to the community to give up.
A protest is arranged in Notting Hill, with Jones-Le Cointe and Howe addressing the crowd and they march to the local police station to protest against Pulley and his fellow officers.
Forced back by the police, they march into another street where they meet another line of officers.
Scuffles break out as a man pulls a placard carried by Rochenda Sandall's Barbara Beese and snaps it in two.
Beese is arrested in the subsequent melee and Jones-Le Cointe is also seized.
Soon the Mangrove Nine are facing charges of causing a riot and affray.
McQueen and Siddons switch their attention to the minutiae of the courtroom drama, as the nine accused and Jack Lowden and Richard Cordery's barristers Ian MacDonald and Mr Croft set about building their defence.
MacDonald is willing to antagonise the system, while Croft is far more conservative.
And that is why the Scottish barrister is taken with the idea of Howe and Jones-Le Cointe representing themselves and to making the argument to have an all black jury.
His and the defendants' strategy is designed to get under the skin of Alex Jennings' Judge Clarke by reminding jurors and the general public of the ridiculousness of the charges.
But as the trial unfolds, Jones-Le Cointe and Howe in particular are able to expose major weaknesses in the prosecution's case.
Even though they are able to do so, the stresses of facing possible successful prosecution are still felt by the defendants, with Crichlow, Jones-Le Cointe, Nathaniel Martello-White's Rhodan Gordon and Beese all cracking under the pressure at various times.
What really impresses, though, is the way McQueen and Siddons break through the conventions of a typical courtroom drama.
With the help of cinematographer Shabier Kirchner, McQueen allows the camera to occasionally prowl and it doesn't always follow usual Hollywood filmmaking conventions.
A sequence where a court officer over-reacts during a recess while Howe is consulting MacDonald, bundling him and Crichlow into holding cells below the courtroom is notable for one shot.
An intense and cold white glow emanates as the offucer peers at Crichlow ranting and raging through a narrow, rectangular cell door window.
It is also a clever echo of an earlier image of the disturbances in Notting Hill from a police van and a significant piece of evidence during the trial.
A sequence when the camera is mounted on top of a police van during a raid with the flashing blue light in the foreground may or may not be an intentional, ironic nod to 'The Naked Gun' and 'Police Squad' but it ends up highlighting the ridiculousness of the officers' actions.
Kirchner and McQueen also shun convention during the delivery of the verdict.
Instead of concentrating on each member of the accused as the jury foreman delivers each verdict, they focus only on Crichlow's reaction.
With Aaron Sorkin's 'The Trial of the Chicago Seven' still fresh in the memory, McQueen's take on the courtroom drama outshines it by simply being more cinematic and overcoming the tendency of most courtroom dramas to be too theatrical.
Most courtroom dramas descend into static showcases of each actor's prowess and while Sorkin's drama was enjoyable, McQueen's feels braver.
'Small Axe; Mangrove' proves a great courtroom drama isn't all about the verbal jousting.
The camera also tells the tale and it tells it very effectively.
McQueen also once again draws out strong performances from the cast.
Parkes is terrific as the tormented and conflicted Trinidadian Crichlow, who suddenly finds his efforts to provide a home from home for his community have descended into a battlefield.
Kirby and Wright turn in full throttle performances as Howe and Jones-Le Cointe.
Sandall, Martello-White, Richie Campbell as Rothwell Kentish and Jumayn Hunter as Godfrey Millett all bring deep wells of passion to their roles.
Lowden is good value as the unconventional barrister Ian McDonald, with Cordery serving as a striking play it safe counterpoint to him.
Samuel West is also reliable as the prosecuting QC, Mr Hill while Alex Jennings' amuses as the judge desperately trying to keep order in an often unruly courtroom.
Llewella Gideon and Gary Beadle inject warmth and good humour and compassion into their roles as the Mangrove employees, Aunt Betty and Dalton Isaacs.
Tahj Miles is effective as Kendrick Manning, a popular target for the police and Michelle Greenidge delivers a notable explosion of rage as his mum in a sequence where her son emerges battered and bruised after police officers in the station gaslight her about his disappearance.
Spruell and Coombes make the most of their roles as the ignorant, bigoted villains of the piece with the former revelling in his character's blatant stupidity and misplaced sense of privilege, while Quinn hints at the unease of his officer at their bigotry.
As with all McQueen projects, nothing feels rushed - even at the most heightened points of the drama.
McQueen allows events to unfold, with the camera picking up striking, fleeting moments of detail.
But at a running time of just over two hours, 'Small Axe: Mangrove' gets its pacing exactly right and never drags.
With its grounded reggae soundtrack, the first film sets a very high bar for the rest of the anthology.
But more importantly it shines a disturbing light on a key moment in the history of race relations in Britain by focusing on a disturbing, significant and often overlooked case.
And for that, we should be especially grateful.
('Small Axe: Mangrove' aired on BBC1 on November 15, 2020 and was made available for streaming on Amazon Prime in North America from November 20, 2020)
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