Rocks

Crafted in collaboration with its cast and other young Londoners, Rocks sees Suffragette director Sarah Gavron train her lens on a story of sisterly solidarity that's bang up to date. In a terrifically nuanced debut turn, Bukky Bakray plays British-Nigerian teenager Shola, better known as "Rocks". At the outset, her mother walks out on her and her little brother (D'angelou Osei Kissiedu) and Rocks attempts to hold it together with the help of a clutch of close friends. Kinetic camerawork reflects Rocks's domestic instability and seesawing emotions, while the film lovingly captures the cultures that exist side-by-side in London. Rather than being filtered through the prism of grown-up understanding, Gavron's film sports unpolished energy and bags of believable teen banter. The girls themselves are utter charmers (including Kosar Ali as the sensitive Sumaya), whether chilling on a tower-block rooftop discussing their dreams, giving each other an affectionate ribbing, trying to master dance moves, or squaring up to their peers. Our protagonist's circumstances can be truly crushing, but that her pals have her back is in little doubt. Though it concludes a touch suddenly, Rocks is a bona fide heartbreaker - a film that never, for one second, feels anything less than real.