21/07/2012

Tom Sutcliffe and his guests writer Kamila Shamsie, historian Dominic Sandbrook and film-maker Carol Morley review the week's cultural highlights including The Dark Knight Rises

The Dark Knight Rises is the final film in Christopher Nolan's Batman trilogy. Christian Bale reprises his role as the caped crusader, coming out of seclusion after seven years to save Gotham from another existential threat.

Dutch author Herman Koch's novel The Dinner has already become a best-seller across Europe. The book's narrator - Paul - is having dinner at an exclusive restaurant with his brother Serge and their two wives, but the agenda behind the meal is driven by an outrage committed by their respective sons.

Nicholas Hytner's National Theatre production of Shakespeare's rarely performed play Timon of Athens stars Simon Russell Beale. Timon is a wealthy businessman whose abundant generosity wins him huge popularity. But when he falls on hard times, his erstwhile friends are not prepared to bail him out and he descends into misanthropy and destitution.

The Radio 4 series Amanda Vickery On...Men sees the social historian exploring the way in which modern masculinity has developed from various historical constructs. Each episode deals with a different era and the ideals of male behaviour that arose in it.

Tate Modern in London has just opened a new space dedicated to performance and video art. The Tanks were formerly huge oil tanks used when Bankside power station was still operational. The inaugural exhibition comprises work by Sung Hwan Kim, Lis Rhodes and Suzanne Lacy and dance performances by Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker.

Producer: Torquil MacLeod.