Photo: SundanceTV
Top of the Lake
Top of the Lake is a seven part miniseries starring Elizabeth Moss and Holly Hunter, and it will blow your doors off. It’s eerie and unsettling, and is one of the best non-murder mystery mysteries out there.
Moss plays Robin Griffin, who returns to her small New Zealand town to solve the case of a missing pregnant 12 year old. The girl walked into the freezing lake, then disappeared. What starts out as a simple missing persons case turns into the uncovering of a lot of sinister secrets about the town and Griffin herself. She has to face down a lot of demons from her past, and this helps, and sometimes hurts, her investigation. She runs into opposition from her ex-lovers and from the father of the missing girl, and it seems like she’s really the only one interested in discovering the truth.
Top of the Lake came out at a time when peak TV was at its pinnacle, and this SundanceTV series was largely overlooked by audiences (although not critics). The series is breathtaking without being overly dramatic, and its both disturbing and melancholy.
Season one of Top of the Lake is available on Netflix. A second season will air next year.