CHRISTOPHER STEVENS reviews last night's TV

A graphic account of an atrocity that turned paradise into Hell: CHRISTOPHER STEVENS reviews last night’s TV

Bali 2002 

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Jamie Cooks The Mediterranean

Rating:

The fact that the terrorist atrocity drama Bali 2002 (ITV1) aired on one of the hottest nights of the year only increased its humid atmosphere of foreboding.

Viewers who sweltered as they watched could all too easily imagine what it must have been like in that Indonesian tourist resort, in the hours before two bombs erupted, killing scores of holidaymakers at the local nightspots.

Little else was left to the imagination, in this graphic and bloody account of the bombings. Claudia Jessie led an ensemble cast as Polly, a financial trader on honeymoon with husband Dan and a dozen or so of their closest friends.

We didn’t learn much about Polly and Dan, except that they met in Bali on holiday and adored the place so much that they wanted to share it with their wedding guests. There were glimpses of Polly’s tough, business-like side and her lack of sentimentality — so that, when she was lying in a chaotic hospital ward, calling for her dead husband, her pain was all the more shocking to see.

Little else was left to the imagination, in this graphic and bloody account of the bombings

This four-part Australian production worked briskly to introduce as many of the victims as possible, without overwhelming us or losing sight of the most important point: that everyone who was injured or died was loved by someone. These people were not just statistics.

We met a bunch of footballers and a couple of Australian girls on a shopping-and-cocktails spree, but the narrative never lingered too long on any of them. By the end, the focus was shifting towards those who arrived later, including a doctor and an anaesthetist who broke off their holiday to offer whatever help they could at the hospital.

Almost before the blast had stopped ringing in our ears, a political angle began to take shape too, the Australian government barging in with a lack of diplomatic finesse.

One of the difficulties with a true-life drama about terrorism is how to show that the killers were human too, while condemning and not glamourising them.

When this is mishandled, the results can be wretched — such as the 2017 Channel 4 drama The State, which portrayed young British Muslims joining Isis as idealists driven to desperate measures.

Almost before the blast had stopped ringing in our ears, a political angle began to take shape too

Bali 2002 showed the two suicide bombers as brainwashed, and manipulated by a shadowy cult leader. Each one was almost paralysed with terror before he pressed the trigger. They were pathetic, but not evil.

Counterbalance was supplied by Sri Ayu Jati Kartika, as the young wife of a nightclub barman. She made a tearful speech at the start and, in the most haunting and effective scene of the hour, she sang a lullaby to her children: a few blocks away, the bombmaker was soldering the last wires of the device that would kill her husband and so many others.

It was not unrelentingly grim: the camera couldn’t resist cutting away at moments to remind us how supernaturally beautiful Bali is. But the best views of the weekend belonged to Jamie Oliver, as he toured the east coast of Greece. 

Jamie Cooks The Mediterranean (Ch4) took him first to Thessaloniki, where he tucked into fish so fresh, the chef invites diners to select their own at the fishmonger’s.

The sunshine was making Jamie frisky. He managed to say nothing about the beef cheeks, served on a long doughy flatbread, but he got the titters over his ‘crispy bottom’ as he toasted rice on an outdoor grill.

Jamie Cooks The Mediterranean (Ch4) took him first to Thessaloniki, where he tucked into fish so fresh, the chef invites diners to select their own at the fishmonger’s

And by the time he was ‘massaging plums’, at an island farm famous for its hand-softened prunes, he was getting slightly delirious.

The farmer’s grandfather was a sprightly 103 years old. Maybe it’s true what they say about prune juice being good for you.

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