In Mangrove, Oscar winning writer-director Steve McQueen (Hunger, Shame, 12 Years a Slave) presents a stunning, heartfelt and timely retelling of a sombre chapter in British history. Part of Small Axe, a five episode miniseries made for the BBC, the film tells the story of a group of black British campaigners whose landmark civil rights trial made national and international headlines in the early 1970s.

Restaurant owner Frank Crichlow (Line of Duty and Lost In Space star Shaun Parkes) is at the end of his tether. Ever since opening a new West Indian restaurant at the heart of Notting Hill in West London, Frank has seen his premises continuously raided and ransacked by the local police led by the overzealous PC Frank Pulley (Sam Spruell). Things come to a head when a fed up Frank, accompanied by a group of assorted black activists, decides to hold a demonstration to protest police brutality against him and his community.

The demonstration soon turns into a full blown riot when peaceful protestors are surrounded and nine of them are arrested and charged of disturbing the peace. Amongst them were Crichlow, prominent civil rights activist Darcus Howe (Malachi Kirby) and Atheia Jones-LeCointe (an exquisite turn by Letitia Wright), a member of the British Black Panther movement.

McQueen and co-writer Alastair Siddons have given us an engaging, passionate and impeccably acted historical drama. There are moments of justified anger and frustration at a corrupt system in a Britain still dominated by Enoch Powell and his 1968 ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech.

Elevated by Shabier Kirchner’s sharp and gorgeously evocative cinematography, Mangrove mixes stirring magical realism and social drama and the results are truly out of this world. For her part, production designer Helen Scot provides a frighteningly accurate representation of London in the early 70s in all its colours and political fervency.

As Frank, Shawn Parkes delivers a beautifully still and impassioned turn as a man who has nothing left to lose. Elsewhere, Jack Lowden (Dunkirk, Mary Queen of Scots) is hugely likeable as Ian MacDonald, the young lawyer representing some of the accused, while Malachi Kirby manages to capture the spirit of the late Darcus Howe impeccably.

This an outstanding piece of filmmaking and a timely reminder of the progress achieved by all those who dared to stand up for their rights despite constant intimidations. There’s no doubt that McQueen excels at these kinds of historical narratives and long may his quest to tell these important stories continue.