Rocks

Fifteen-year-old Rocks comes home one day to find her mum gone — just a note and a little cash left behind. Rocks (2020) is a British drama from Sarah Gavron you can watch online on iFILM, and the weight of her little brother Emmanuel now rests on her shoulders.

Rocks dreads one thing above all: if any adult finds out, she and her brother will be split up and put into care. So she stretches it out — dodging social workers, counting coins, sleeping on friends' floors, lying to everyone in turn. The ones who pull her through aren't grown-ups but her own crew of East London girls. Bukky Bakray, in her first role, carries the film without a single false beat.

Gavron cast non-professionals from ordinary schools and let them improvise, which is why the friendships feel observed rather than performed. Bakray won the BAFTA Rising Star Award for the part. It's an honest, vivid look at growing up with no parent in the room. Stream Rocks (2020) online on iFILM.