Dir.: Sam Miller; Script: Philomena McDonagh; Phot.: Janet Tovey; Ed.: Elen Pierce Lewis; Mus.: Transglobal Underground; Cast: Louise Atkins, Cathy Purcell, Margot Leicester, Jim Millea, Jason Hughes, Angela Saville; Prod.: Hilary Salmon, BBC, Pebble Mill Road, Birmingham B5 7QQ (Grande-Bretagne), tél.: (121) 414 2537, fax: (121) 414 8626; Sales: BBC Worlwide, Woodlands, 80 Wood Lane, Londres W12 0TT, tél.: (181) 576 2000 .

When 14-year-old Gail's father dies suddenly, she can't believe that life could get any worse. She's wrong. Returning to school after his funeral, she's greeted not with sympathy but with verbal and physical abuse from The King Girls -- a gang of girls who leave her terrified. It starts with spiteful notes being passed in class, vicious name-calling, spitting and demands for money. As the bullying escalates, Gail is isolated by her classmates, attacked in the school toilets, pushed down a flight of stairs and chased home by a baying mob who threaten to kill her mother if she tells anyone. Gail's main tormentor is Glenn, the hard-as-nails leader of The King Girls who swears and bullies her way through life. Glenn shares a dingy council flat with her younger sister Emma-Louise and her drunken, foul-mouthed mom Gloria, who thinks nothing of bringing men back to the flat for sex in front of her daughters. Gail's home life couldn't be more different. Despite her dad's death, her loving mother is determined to carry on with life and to help Gail come to terms with their loss. Against this complex background, the very different lives of Gail and Glenn become entangled as the girls head for a dramatic confrontation.