Coming Up: Sink or Swim

Another largely excellent run of this hardy new talent drama strand comes to an end tonight. ‘Coming Up’ 2013 finishes with Line Langebek’s ‘Sink or Swim’, another charming and superbly realised mood piece which makes maximum use of its brief running time.

The premise is simple: elderly former synchronised swimmer Cynthia (Una Stubbs) is being looked after by her teen granddaughter Ellie (Charlotte Beaumont). The social want to takes them both into care but the pair’s connection is too strong to give up that easily. This could easily descend into bleak kitchen-sink melodrama but instead, the tone is midway between farce and fairytale as Cynthia and Ellie’s bond is celebrated even in its most challenged moment. Sweet.