A life lost
Heartbreaking drama imagines what Anthony Walker might have gone on to do had the teenager not been killed in a racist attack
‘THIS is the life he could have lived.”
These are the devastating words that flash up on the screen as this heartbreaking drama begins. It’s enough to make your blood run cold.
On July 29, 2005, in Huyton, Merseyside, Anthony Walker was murdered by racists with an ice axe in an unprovoked attack. He was 18 years old.
The Liverpool teenager, a devout Christian with a love of basketball, was halfway through college with dreams to study law at university.
This film tells the story of the life he could have lived, gradually moving backwards in time until the day of his death. His future gradually stripped away.
Written by Jimmy McGovern, who was asked by Anthony’s mother Gee Walker to tell her son’s story, it makes for upsetting viewing.
It begins with Anthony at the age of 25, winning an award for helping an alcoholic friend battle his addiction and get his family back.
As time moves backwards, we see Anthony, played by Toheeb Jimoh, preparing to be a civil rights lawyer, getting married and becoming a father.
It’s the wedding he never
had, the child he never had, the career he never had.
One cannot possibly imagine how Gee Walker, played here by Rakie Ayola, must feel watching this.
It all builds to the brutal reality of what happened that night in July, with horrific scenes of the murder and a mother’s grief.
As with everything from McGovern, expect a gritty, unrelenting and timely account of an important tragedy that should not be forgotten.