This trio of economical portraits of three women escaping the confines of restrictive relationships pretty much does what it says on the packet.

However, there's some pretty clunking dialogue and unconvincing scenarios to distract even those viewers who may be sympathetic to their plight.

The story of Delia (Sedgewick) is the most straightforward and, therefore, the most effective of the three.

The product of a trailer-trash broken home - a common theme here - her low self-esteem results in her becoming pretty much the school bike.

Marrying early to a deceptive thug, who begins to knock her about when she finds herself tied by love to him, she eventually gets out when the children suffer.

Miller sees her embarking on a journey to reclaim "her power"...an interesting take on Delia supplying hand relief to a spotty youth in his pick-up truck.

Cook book editor Greta (Posey) is an altogether less convincing character - a career-driven professional with scant regard to the marriage vows.

Her kind but less-than-dynamic husband doesn't actually do anything wrong... but he gets edited out of her life just the same.

A redundant sub-text to Greta's story is a clumsy reference to her mother's background in Auschwitz, which appears to have been shoe-horned in for shock value alone.

Lastly, pregnant punkette Paula (Balk) suffers a near-death experience then sets off on a journey of self-discovery.

Picking up a teenage runaway whom she subsequently discovers has been tortured (we never find out why), she finds a spring in her step when he nicks her car.

None are particularly likeable characters, and you find yourself wondering in Greta and Paula's case why they didn't just nip down the wine bar and thrash it out there.

Review by Tim Evans