DVD review: The Night Of (5 out of 5)

Riz Ahmed and John Turturro in 'The Night Of'

This box set should come with an explicit warning - '˜watch the first 20 minutes and you'll be hooked and left with uncontrollable desire to ignore everything else until you have finished the series'.

TV has gone through an amazing renaissance in the past years with the result that writers and producers have to come up with top quality shows to get an audience.

And the team behind The Night Of have certainly pulled together an outstanding mini series.

I may be cynical, but when I see a press release full of compliments my first reaction is to doubt them all.

But the glowing praise this time is fully justified.

The best word I’ve seen bandied around The Night Of is ‘understated’.

From the first few minutes you are gently introduced to Naz (Riz Ahmed), a Pakistani-American from a normal loving family who decides to take his father’s taxi and go in search of a party in Manhattan, held by some fellow college students.

However, he gets lost and by chance ends up in the company of a beautiful young woman.

A few hours later he wakes up in her flat, but she has been savagely murdered.

You may think that is a massive spoiler, but in truth that’s just the start of the plot.

As the series progresses we watch the story twist and turn, with racism, politics and all manner of other factors coming into play.

The best part is that understated element, so it feels almost like a documentary and you are being allowed a glimpse into the events.

John Turturro is the lawyer, an unconventional and rather shabby character, while Bill Camp is the detective leading the case.

But the series is full of fascinating characters.

If you’re looking for one of the best box sets of 2016 then you won’t go far wrong with The Night Of.

The Night Of is released by HBO Home Entertainment and is available as Digital HD, Blu-ray with Digital HD & DVD with Digital HD and as a download.