drama
Murder: The Third Voice, BBC TwoFriday, 04 March 2016
Three and a half years ago the writer Robert Jones and producer Kath Mattock came at the crime genre from an unusual angle. Instead of having characters in a murder case talk to one another, they all addressed the camera directly, each offering... Read more... |
Vinyl, Sky AtlanticTuesday, 16 February 2016
You can almost hear the words ringing out in the dramatic pauses. “We should call it Vinyl. Like, y’know... when you could hold music in your hand... touch it... FEEL it. When it was really WORTH something. The Seventies – that was when music had... Read more... |
Deutschland 83, Series Finale, Channel 4Monday, 15 February 2016
Martin Rauch-stroke-Moritz Stamm, the reluctant spy who by the end of the final, double episode of this eight-parter had achieved more than most in that profession, managed the ultimate last night: he came in from the cold. In a series whose refrain... Read more... |
Happy Valley, Series 2, BBC OneWednesday, 10 February 2016
“It’s routine, it’s procedure.” “It’s wank, it’s toss.” As you can tell, Happy Valley is back. If Sally Wainwright made bespoke ironmongery or dry stone walls or exceedingly good cakes, her work would come by royal appointment. Instead you can tell... Read more... |
Horace and PeteWednesday, 10 February 2016
“Warning: this show is not a ‘comedy,’” wrote comedian Louis CK in an email alerting fans to the impending arrival of the second episode of his new show, Horace and Pete. “I dunno what it is. It can be funny. And also not. Both. I believe that ‘... Read more... |
The X-Files, Channel 5Tuesday, 09 February 2016
It’s 2016, and The X-Files is the most popular TV show in the world. The very idea that over 20 million people in the US would tune in to a new episode of the pioneering sci-fi drama 14 years after the last one might seem as preposterous as the... Read more... |
DVD: 99 HomesTuesday, 02 February 2016
The opening scene of Ramin Bahrani’s 99 Homes plunges us into the darker depths of American society, post-2008 financial crisis. We’re in the world of home repossessions, and the blood spattered around the bathroom of one property by an ex-owner who... Read more... |
P’yongyang, Finborough TheatreSaturday, 16 January 2016
Every incarnation of totalitarianism has its own specific mythology, which exists in different forms as it is believed at home and “translated” abroad (or not, in both cases). North Korea surely occupies a special place in any such hierarchy,... Read more... |
A WarThursday, 07 January 2016
Tobias Lindholm is something of a specialist in exploring the fate of enclosed groups under stress, charting how the dynamics of behaviour between men develop in crisis. I say men, though the Danish director’s name may still be better known in some... Read more... |
Dickensian, BBC OneSunday, 27 December 2015
There are around 800 pages in a Dickensian doorstopper and it has been said around 800 times that if Dickens were working today he would be a show runner on a soap. Finally it has come to pass. Andrew Davies attempted something similar with his... Read more... |
In the Heart of the SeaSaturday, 26 December 2015
A host of pictorially arresting, even painterly images can't make a satisfying whole out of In the Heart of the Sea, Ron Howard's film that doesn't dig very deep, its penetrating title notwitstanding. Howard has always been drawn to unusual realms,... Read more... |
Fargo, Series 2 Finale, Channel 4Tuesday, 22 December 2015
It stands to reason that the contents of a prequel can never be entirely surprising. Some details have to be constants, some plot twists left unturned. As soon as it became clear that the second series of Noah Hawley’s Fargo predated the events of... Read more... |
