Saturday Review
321 episodes - English - Latest episode: about 4 years ago - ★★★★★ - 67 ratingsPresenter Tom Sutcliffe and guests offer sharp, critical discussion of the week's cultural events
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Episodes
Temple, Man Up, Humans, Sense8, Ryan Gattis, Grayson Perry
May 30, 2015 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBTemple is a new play at London's Donmar Warehouse. It imagines what happened behind the scenes when the Occupy Movement took over the steps of St Paul's Cathedral in 2011. Simon Pegg stars in Man Up - an unconventional rom-com about a blind date that goes hilariously wrong. We review 2 new TV Sci-fi dramas: Humans on Channel 4 and Sense8 on Netflix - can they compete with the bigger budgets of film? Ryan Gattis' novel: All Involved is a fictionalised account of the 1992 LA riots which follo...
Owen Sheers, Ninagawa's Hamlet, Home in Manchester, The New Girlfriend, Armada on BBC One
May 23, 2015 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBOwen Sheers' novel I Saw A Man deals with loss, grief, guilt and attempted redemption Japanese director Yukio Ninagawa has directed Hamlet 8 times. His latest production is playing at The Barbican in London - how well does this 17th Century English play transfer to a setting in 19th Century Japan? Manchester has a brand new arts centre: Home. What will it add to to Manchester's vibrant arts scene? Francois Ozon's film The New Girlfriend is based on a Ruth Rendell novel. How does the cross-d...
Mad Max, Cornelia Parker, Pirates of Penzance, Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell, TC Boyle
May 16, 2015 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBArtist Cornelia Parker's contribution to The British Library's Magna Carta octocentennial exhibition is an embroidery interpretation of the Wikipedia page for this cornerstone of the British constitution. What does it add to the commemorations? There's a new Mad Max film, "Fury Road", with Tom Hardy replacing Mel Gibson in the title role - it's two hours of more-or-less non-stop action and taken decades to reach the screen; is it worth the wait? Film director Mike Leigh is a big fan of th...
The Vote, The Crow Eaters, Girlhood, Brighton Festival, Grace and Frankie
May 09, 2015 18:15 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBThe Vote is a comedy set in a polling station on election night, performed live at the Donmar Warehouse and simultaneously broadcast on More4. Starring Mark Gatiss, Judi Dench, Catherine Tate and nearly 40 more actors, can it have a life after we announce our verdict? Bapsi Sidhwa's novel The Crow Eaters is a classic of Pakistani writing; a darkly humorous tale of a family in Lahore in the early 1900s. fans include Salman Rushdie, Hanif Kureishi and Fatima Bhutto. What will our panel make of...
Everyman, Far from the Madding Crowd, Empire, Anne Enright, Christopher Williams
May 02, 2015 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBCarol Ann Duffy has adapted the 16th century morality play Everyman for London's National Theatre, with Chiwetel Ejiofor in the title role There's a new film version of Far From The Madding Crowd, this time with Carey Mulligan as Bathsheba Everdene - is it fair to compare it with the 1969 version? Empire is a TV phenomenon in the US; a tale of power and intrigue at a hip hop record label - like a black Dynasty crossed with King Lear - it has drawn unprecedented audiences and now it's come to...
Toni Morrison, Ah Wilderness!, Indigenous Australians, A Pigeon Sat on a Branch, Storyville: Himmler
April 25, 2015 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBToni Morrison's new novel, God Help The Child explores issues including skin colour prejudice, child abuse and justice. Eugene O'Neill's 1933 play Ah Wilderness! is one of his less-performed works. He described it as a folk comedy, is it still funny today? The British Museum exhibition, Indigenous Australians: Enduring Civilisation, looks at 60 millennia of Aboriginal life and art A Pigeon Sat On A Branch Reflecting On Existence is the peculiar Lion d'Or winning film from Sweden - is it fun...
Carmen Disruption, Home From Home, Caryl Phillips, Sonia Delaunay
April 18, 2015 19:00 - 42 minutes - 38.5 MBCarmen Disruption is Simon Stephens' radical reworking of Bizet's opera, exploring the place where the actor becomes the character they're playing Home From Home, a 4 hour long cinematic prequel to the 53 hour long TV series Heimat, tells the tale of a fictional rural German village from the 1840s to the 1990s. Caryl Phillips' latest novel The Lost Child reimagines Wuthering Heights through several interweaving narratives. An exhibition of the work of Sonia Delaunay at Tate Modern is design...
Eric Ravilious, Force Majeure, Ice Rink on the Estate, After Electra, Jesse Armstrong
April 11, 2015 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBEric Ravilious was one of the finest watercolourists that the UK has ever produced. Born in 1903, he died in 1942 while on duty as an official war artist. Does a new exhibition of his work reveal his genius? In Swedish film 'Force Majeure', an avalanche during a family skiing holiday causes no physical damage but opens fissures in the happy family structure Olympic gold medallists Torvill & Dean have a new TV series: 'Ice Rink On The Estate'. They attempt to turn a group of kids from a depri...
Death of a Salesman, While We're Young, Alfred Hitchcock, Frames in Focus, Sex and the Church
April 04, 2015 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBArthur Miller's Pullitzer prize winning 1949 play, Death of a Salesman, set in Brooklyn in New York, is one of the greatest American tragedies ever written. In a production to celebrate the centenary of Miller's birth at the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford on Avon, Artistic Director Greg Doran directs Anthony Sher as Willy Loman, Harriet Walter as his wife Linda and Alex Hassel as their son Biff. How well does this production portray the darkness that lies at the heart of the American...
Rules for Living, Blind, Richard III, Acts of the Assassins, Body in Ancient Greek Art
March 28, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBSam Holcroft's new play, Rules For Living, at The National's Dorfman Theatre shows a family full of traits and ticks that define their relationships. How do we react when we're under pressure with our nearest and dearest? The Norwegian film Blind plays around with perception. The lead character loses her sight and has to reassess her relationship with the world and especially those around her. We've been watching Channel 4's coverage of the re-internment of Richard III. How fascinating ca...
Richard Diebenkorn, Mommy, Frozen, The Shore, Coalition
March 21, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBThe first major retrospective of Richard Diebenkorn's work for 25 years opens at London's Royal Academy. Derided by some for making abstract art popular, does this new show, which includes his figurative paintings too, restore his reputation as a serious artist? A new Channel 4 drama "Coalition" dramatises the negotiations which took place immediately after the last general election and is based on first hand research by writer James Graham, whose past work includes Privacy, Tory Boyz and th...
Alexander McQueen, Suite Francaise, X+Y, Antigone, Tom McCarthy
March 14, 2015 20:00 - 42 minutes - 38.5 MBWhen an exhibition of the fashion creations of Alexander McQueen opened in New York, visitors queued for up to 5 hours to get in. It's now at London's Victoria and Albert Museum; will it be such a crowd-puller Suite Francaise - Irene Nemerovski's wartime novel (discovered more than six decades after her death) was a best seller. Can it repeat its success as a film? X+Y is a film about a young maths prodigy who is on the autistic spectrum. It deals with his participation in the International ...
Still Alice, Game, Nurse, David Vann, Forensics
March 07, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBJulianne Moore won an Oscar for her performance as Alice, who has Early Onset Alzheimer's disease in Still Alice. Does a great performance make a great movie? Mike Bartlett's new play Game at London's Almeida theatre raises questions about how desperate people become when they're looking for somewhere to live. Paul Whitehouse plays multiple characters in his TV series Nurse which is transferring from Radio 4 to BBC2. It deal with the travails of a Community Psychiatric Nurse and her patients...
Ishiguro, Man and Superman, It Follows, Matt Lucas - Pompidou, Sculpture Victorious
February 28, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBThe Buried Giant is Kazuo Ishiguro's first new novel for 10 years, set in Arthurian England George Bernard Shaw's Man and Superman at The National's Lyttleton Theatre starring Ralph Fiennes New horror film It Follows has been a success in the US and could be a new teen creepy classic Matt Lucas' is best known for Little Britain; his new TV show is entirely devoid of catchphrases - it's a wordless series called Pompidou Sculpture Victorious at Tate Britain looks at sculpture created during Qu...
The Duke of Burgundy, The Kind Worth Killing, Suffragettes Forever, Art from Elsewhere, Eugene Onegin
February 21, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBThe production of Eugene Onegin by Moscow's Vakhtangov State Academic Theatre being staged at London's Barbican sold out for a year in Russia and the international tour sells to packed-out houses The Duke of Burgundy is Peter Strickland's latest film which looks at the love affair between 2 sub-dom lesbian lepidopterists Amanda Vickery presents BBC2's Suffragettes Forever, a three part series trying to tell "the unknown story" of "Britain's longest war, the 300 year-long campaign by women ...
Anne Tyler, Indian Summers, Love Is Strange, How to Hold Your Breath, History Is Now
February 14, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBAnne Tyler's latest novel 'A Spool of Blue Thread' (her 20th) follows the dynamics of an American family through several generations Indian Summers is a sumptuous drama on Channel 4 looking at life in India in 1932. It stars Julie Walters and follows the early stirrings of political opposition to The Raj Love Is Strange is a film with Jon Lithgow and Alfred Molina as a gay couple who decide to get married after being together for 40 years and their relationship is put under a strain by force...
Selma, Human Right Human Wrongs, The Illuminations, You're Not Alone, Better Call Saul
February 07, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBTom Sutcliffe and this weeks panel discuss the film Selma, which tells the story of Martin Luther King and struggle for black voting rights in 1960s America. It charts the freedom march between Selma and Montgomery in the segregated deep south, and the high price paid for democracy. Human Rights Human Wrongs is the latest exhibition in The Photographers Gallery in London. It charts, through photojournalism, how violent flash points through the world in 20th century have shaped our perception...
Tom Stoppard, Inherent Vice, Adam Curtis, Joyce Carol Oates, Christian Marclay
January 31, 2015 20:00 - 42 minutes - 38.5 MBTom Stoppard's play The Hard Problem is his first new work for the National Theatre in 13 years; is it worth the wait? Paul Thomas Anderson has adapted a Thomas Pynchon novel Inherent Vice - the first time a cinema director has wrestled this famously difficult author onto the screen. How well does it work? Documentary maker Adam Curtis's Bitter Lake attempts to explain the complicated political situation in Afghanistan. It's only available on iPlayer; might this be a new way for the BBC to '...
Oppenheimer, A Most Violent Year, Fortitude, Rubens, Sandip Roy
January 24, 2015 20:00 - 42 minutes - 38.5 MBThe RSC's latest production is Oppenheimer, a play about the man behind the invention of the nuclear bomb - a flawed hero, is it a flawless production? A Most Violent Year is set in New York in 1981, a year when more than 1.2m crimes were committed. JC Chandor's film follows a man trying to build up a family business in the face of alarming violence and corruption. Fortitude is Arctic noir TV. Set in an Icelandic Research Station where mysterious and untoward things start happening, the cast...
Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Wild, Wolf Hall, Adam Thirlwell and Bull
January 17, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBWomen on the verge of a nervous breakdown; Pedro Almodovar's film has been turned into a stage musical with Tamsin Greig as Pepa Marcos. It flopped on Broadway, now thoroughly rejigged, can it succeed in London? Reese Witherspoon is in the running for an Oscar playing Cheryl in Wild, about a woman who sets off to discover herself on a 1100 mile walk in the wilderness. Wolf Hall was first a best-selling book by Hilary Mantel, then an RSC play and now it comes to BBCTV, with Mark Rylance as Th...
Whiplash, Foxcatcher, Daniel Kitson's Tree, Cucumber Banana Tofu, Weathering
January 10, 2015 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBA review of the week's cultural highlights.
Birdman; 10:04 by Ben Lerner; Golem at Young Vic; Crisis TV drama; Kentucky Route Zero computer game
January 03, 2015 20:00 - 42 minutes - 38.6 MBBirdman starring Michael Keaton is director Alejandro G Inarritu's first comedy and is hotly tipped for Academy Awards - does it live up to the hype? 10 04 by Ben Lerner is the poet, essayist and novelist's second work of fiction which probes the reality of his own life and in doing so raises questions about the nature of fiction and truth itself. Golem is staged at the Young Vic by the 1927 theatre company and combines performance and live music with handcrafted animation and film to create...
V&A Cast Court, City of Angels, Big Eyes, Kureishi/Murakami/AN Wilson, Mapp and Lucia
December 20, 2014 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBLondon's V+A Museum has just reopened the Weston Cast Court, which houses life-size plaster casts of statuary and artefacts from around Europe. It includes the museum's largest items, can it draw their largest crowds? Larry Gelbart's City of Angels is revived at London's Donmar Warehouse. A musical about the golden age of Hollywood, it garnered awards galore 25 years ago in its original run, will this production be a winner? Tim Burton's new film Big Eyes is about 1960s housewife Margaret Ke...
13/12/2014
December 13, 2014 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBTreasure Island is The National Theatre's seasonal offering at The Olivier, full of pirates, parrots and seaspray. How does it play to the various audiences who come to the theatre at Christmas time? Electricity is a film starring model turned actress Agyness Deyn whose character deals with her epilepsy as she tries to find a community to be a part of. Charlie Brooker is back with a one-off feature-length Christmas special edition of Black Mirror on Channel 4. It's a worrying look at a futu...
Men Women and Children, Hope, William Blake, Olive Kitteridge, End of Days by Jenny Erpenbeck
December 06, 2014 20:00 - 42 minutes - 38.5 MBJason Reitman's latest film Men Women and Children is a lighthearted look at the way the internet has become woven into everyone's existence for good or bad; the pitfalls, the temptations and the endless possibilities. Hope is a new play by Jack Thorne at London's Royal Court Theatre. It's a dark comedy about a cash-strapped Labour council trying to balance its books and do the least harm in the face of cuts. William Blake is the subject of a major exhibition at the Ashmolean in Oxford. He ...
William Gibson; Marco Polo; Chimera; Conflict Time Photography; Concerning Violence
November 29, 2014 20:00 - 42 minutes - 38.5 MBWilliam Gibson's novel The Peripheral is set in 2 dystopian futures filled with drugs, 3D printers, high-tech surveillance and various legally dubious practices. When readers are immersed in a complete universe of newness, how do they orientate themselves? Netflix newest production is an epic adventure series (10 x 60 minutes) telling the story of Marco Polo; full of spectacle, does it have substance or is it an Oriental Game of Thrones? London's Gate Theatre is staging Chimera - a play abou...
Institute of Sexology, What We Do in the Shadows, Behind the Beautiful Forevers, Robert Edric, Legacy
November 22, 2014 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBLondon's Wellcome Institute has a new exhibition entitled The Institute of Sexology which it describes as "a candid exploration of the most publicly discussed of private acts". How will our reviewers tiptoe gently around the explicit nature of what's on show? What We Do In The Shadows is a New Zealand vampire comedy film about a group of bloodsucking flatmates (a 'dracumentary' if you will) - who does the washing-up in the house of the undead? Behind The Beautiful Forevers is David Hare's ne...
Rose Tremain; The Imitation Game; Wildefire; Allen Jones; Remember Me
November 15, 2014 20:00 - 42 minutes - 38.5 MBRose Tremain's latest book is a collection of short stories called The American Lover; how does her shorter fiction compare to her full length work? Benedict Cumberbatch plays the WWII cryptographer and code-breaker Alan Turing in The Imitation Game. Also starring Kiera Knightley, it tells the tale of the team of British maths geniuses who cracked the Nazi's Enigma Code. How successfully does it breathe new life into the biography of a private and secretive man? Roy Williams' new play Wildef...
DV8: John, Interstellar, Peter Carey, Gold at Buckingham Palace, Puppy Love
November 07, 2014 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBPeter Carey's latest novel, Amnesia follows a disgraced Australian journalist hired to write the life story of a hacker activist who has raised the hackles of international governments because she wrote the code that unlocks prisons around the world. Carey is has twice won The Booker Prize, is this another winning work? DV8 Physical Theatre Company's new show "John" tells the tale of a man who grows up in an extremely abusive family and who- as an adult - finds comfort and company in gay sau...
Nightcrawler, Tis Pity She's a Whore, Richard Ford, Science Museum, Passing Bells
November 01, 2014 20:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBNightcrawler is a movie about the ambulance-chasing camera crews who film at the site of traffic accidents, shootings etc and sell the footage to TV stations for their news bulletins. Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, we see him begin his nightcrawling career, but will it make a good man turn bad? 'Tis Pity She's a Whore is being staged at London's Globe Theatre. Written in the early 1600s by John Ford, the plot includes incest which made it extremely controversial at the time. And it was so controv...
Grayson Perry, Brad Pitt in Fury, Dance Umbrella: Harlem Dream, Per Petterson I Refuse, The Missing
October 25, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBGrayson Perry's new exhibition at London's National Portrait Gallery is called "Who Are You". Through pots and paintings, a hijab and tapestry it explores the nature of identity. Brad Pitt's latest film Fury follows a tank crew towards the end of WW2, when a rooky soldier joins the grizzled old conflict-hardened team in the hell of war. London's Young Vic Theatre plays host to Dance Umbrella 2014. We'll be reviewing Harlem Dream - a work by young British choreographer Ivan Blackstock in whi...
Here Lies Love, Palo Alto, Life Story, Being Mortal, Germany at the British Museum.
October 18, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBHere Lies Love is David Byrne and Fatboy Slim's disco musical that tells the life story of the former First Lady of the Philippines Imelda Marcos, from poverty to the Presidential Palace. Is she a suitable subject for a musical? Gia Coppola is the grand-daughter of Hollywood titan Francis Ford Coppola and her debut film Palo Alto has just been released in the UK. Does this film show the kind of promise that she might have what it takes as a director to match her aunt Sophia or even her gran...
Henry IV, '71 film, Gotham on TV, Lila by Marilynne Robinson, Tracy Emin
October 11, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBPhyllida Lloyd's all-female production of Henry IV at The Donmar Warehouse. '71, a film about a young British army soldier who becomes separated from his unit while on patrol during The Troubles in Belfast. Gotham is a new series on Channel 5 that explores that city in the days before Batman. Our novel is Lila by Pulitzer-winning Marilynne Robinson; the third part of her Gilead trilogy. Tracy Emin's latest exhibition of drawings, paintings and bronze work at London's White Cube. Razia Iqbal ...
Electra, Gone Girl, The Code, Howard Jacobson, Gothic Imagination
October 04, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBKristin Scott Thomas plays the title role in Electra at The Old Vic. It's a millennia old play in a modern translation by Frank McGuinness and directed by Ian Rickson. David Fincher's film version of Gillian Flynn's best seller Gone Girl stars Ben Affleck and Rosamund Pike. Howard Jacobson's Booker-nominated novel J imagines a dystopian world where a Holocaust-type event might happen again. Gothic Imagination at The British Library explores 250 years of a public predilection for horror a...
The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher, Anselm Kiefer, An Enemy of the People, Ida
September 27, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.1 MBTom Sutcliffe and guests Lisa Appignanesi, Ryan Gilbey and Denise Mina discuss the cultural highlights of the week including two times Booker winner Hilary Mantel's new book of short stories "The Assassination of Margaret Thatcher," in which she turns her gaze away from Tudor England to the challenges of the recent past. The first major of retrospective of German artist Anselm Kiefer in the UK opens at the Royal Academy of Arts in London. From mythology to the Old and New Testaments, Kabbal...
20/09/2014
September 20, 2014 19:30 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBTom Sutcliffe and guests Rosie Boycott, Simon Jenkins and Maria Delgado discuss the cultural highlights of the week, including The Riot Club based on Laura Wade's controversial stage play Posh and which fictionalised the riotous behaviour of Oxford's notorious Bullingdon Club, which David Cameron, George Osborne and Boris Johnson have all been members of. Enda Walsh's new play Ballyturk at the National Theatre has been compared to Samuel Beckett's Waiting For Godot and stars Cillan Murphy, M...
Destiny, Pride, The Leftovers, Ali Smith, Horst
September 13, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 37.7 MBDestiny: the most expensive video game ever produced has just been released - a perfect excuse for us to explore the rich and diverse world of gaming. Pride is a lighthearted film about lesbian and gay groups from London who supported miners during the 84 miners' strike - leading to an unexpectedly harmonious and fruitful relationship. What would America be like after a Rapture-like event when 2% of the population will be taken into heaven and the rest are left behind? The Leftovers is a T...
The Children Act, Little Revolution, Watermark, Secrets, Bernd and Hilla Becher
September 06, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBIan McEwan's new novel The Children Act deals with a young man who is suffering from leukaemia and the conflict between his parent's wishes and the authority of the State in the form of a high court judge. Little Revolution is a play by Alecky Blythe concerning the London riots of 2011 using a script drawn from verbatim interviews Watermark is a film by photographer Edward Burtynsky about the world's most precious resource: H2O. There's a finite amount and it's getting more and more diff...
Martin Amis, Pitcairn, The Moth, Obvious Child, Secret Life of Books
August 30, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBMartin Amis' latest novel The Zone of Interest deals with the Holocaust, but has riled some critics because of its light tone. Pitcairn is Richard "One Man, Two Guv'nors" Bean's new play dealing with the aftermath of The Bounty. The Moth is a public storytelling event that started in America and is now coming to the UK to coincide with a book collection of stories. Obvious Child is a romcom film about abortion which has incurred the wrath of pro-lifers in the US; can it be a suitable topic f...
Saturday Review with Tom Sutcliffe Comes From Edinburgh, Offering a Selection of the Best of the Festivals
August 23, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.1 MBSaturday Review comes from the 2014 Edinburgh Festivals: National Theatre of Scotland's production of a new history play looking at the Scottish Stuart kings - we've been to see James II. Front is a multilingual, multi sensory theatrical experience telling the stories of the First World War. Marion Cotillard's new film, directed by The Dardennes brothers is Two Days One Night; in order to try and save her own job, a woman has to persuade her work colleagues to forgo their annual bonus. The s...
Joseph O'Neill, Robin Wright, Jezebel, Match of the Day at 50 and Andrew Marr's Great Scots
August 16, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBJoseph O'Neill's previous novel Netherland received rapturous attention. His new book The Dog is a story of a New York Lawyer who accepts a job working for a rich college friend in Dubai, but he realises it's a very complicated role he's expected to play. Robin Wright plays a version of herself in The Congress; a live action/cartoon crossover movie directed by Ari Folman (Waltz With Bashir). But where does the fantasy end and reality begin? Jezebel is a comedy by the Dublin-based Rough Mag...
My Night With Reg, Wakolda, Home Front, Kevin Eldon, The Art and Science of Exploration
August 09, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.4 MBKevin Elyot's 'My Night With Reg' was originally staged in 1994 and was the first British gay play to win a wide West End audience as well as several theatre awards. it's now being revived at London's Donmar Warehouse. How well does it stand up 2 decades later? ''Wakolda' is a film which tells the story of an Argentinean family who unwittingly shared their house with the Nazi war criminal Joseph Mengele Auschwitz's "Angel of Death" without realising who he was. As part of Radio 4's' comm...
Gillian Anderson Streetcar, Mood Indigo film, Secret Cinema, Philip Hensher, Gomorrah on TV
August 02, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBGillian Anderson returns to London's West End theatre, playing Blanche Dubois in Tennessee Williams' 1948 play A Streetcar Named Desire. Michel Gondry's Mood Indigo is one of his typically fantastical films, starring Audrey Tatou as a young woman who discovers a flower is growing inside her lungs. Packed full of extraordinary images, is it a collection of moments or a good film? Secret Cinema is the new immersive form of cinema, staged in unconventional settings, encouraging the audience to ...
Medea, Joe, Our World War, DBC Pierre, Imperial War Museum
July 26, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBHelen McCrory is playing Medea in a new production at London's National Theatre - it's a new take on the Greek tragedy; how can one make a play written 1700 years ago resonate today? Nicolas Cage's new film Joe is a gritty blue collar tale of poverty and misery in rural Mississippi. It shows his gentle side rather than a raving onslaught; might this be a chance for viewers to reassess the way his acting has been heading? The BBC's commemoration of the centenary of WW1 continues with a series...
Malevich at Tate Modern, Importance of Being Earnest, Norte, Silicon Valley, Flusfeder: John the Pupil
July 19, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBA new exhibition of work by Russian painter Kasimir Malevich at London's Tate Modern follows his career from early representational work through his cubo-futurist phase, to his creation of the concept of supremacism and back to figurative art. It is grand in its scale and vision and ambition, but will it be packing in the visitors this summer? There's another revival of Oscar Wilde's The Importance Of Being Earnest, with an all-star cast including Nigel Havers and Martin Jarvis. What device...
Intimate Apparel, Boyhood, Upstairs at the Party, People Just Do Nothing, Sikhs in WW1
July 12, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBRichard Linklater's latest film, Boyhood, was filmed over 39 days over a period of 12 years, so the actors and characters on the screen age in real time. When production began, the lead actor was 6 and it follows him dealing with life's ups and downs as he progresses towards adulthood. Linda Grant's new novel Upstairs At The Party is the tale of a group of friends at a northern university in the 1970s and how their lives are changed by a personal catastrophe Intimate Apparel is a play by Afr...
05/07/2014
July 05, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.2 MBGreat Britain at London's Lyttleton Theatre is written by Richard Bean and directed by Nicholas Hytner (the team that was behind the wildly successful 'One Man Two Guvnors'). Starring Billie Piper as an unscrupulous tabloid newspaper editor who is right in the middle of a web of corruption involving phone hacking, politicians the press and the police It's half a century since the Beatles made their big screen debut with A Hard Day's Night. It was considered a lightweight thing by many when ...
Cold in July film, Richard Flanagan novel, Dennis Hopper exhibition, Honourable Woman on TV
June 28, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBCold in July is a film starring Michael C Hall set in 1980s America, telling the story of a man who kills an intruder in his home and then begins to think the local police might not be telling the truth about the victim. Richard Flanagan's novel The Narrow Road To The Deep North is a depiction of the appalling conditions endured by Australasian POWs in Japan during World War 2. Told in flashback, the main character remembers the men with whom he worked on the construction of the Thai-Burma r...
The Fault in Our Stars, The Silkworm, Making Stalin Laugh, Making Colour, The Human Factor
June 21, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBThe Fault In Our Stars, starring Shailene Woodley, is the screen adaptation of John Green's best selling young adult novel of the same name about a pair of love struck teenagers both of whom are terminally ill with cancer. Brought together at a cancer support group the pair embark on a pilgrimage to Holland to meet the author of a book on dying. Green himself was a hospital chaplain and the story is based on an actual encounter with a dying 16 year old girl. Following on from the huge succe...
The Simpsons as American folklore; Belle; British folk art at Tate Britain; In the Light of What We Know
June 14, 2014 19:00 - 41 minutes - 38.3 MBMr Burns at London's Almeida Theatre is a play about an America without electrical power, the end of everything in contemporary USA - when the TV programme The Simpsons has passed into folklore. How do we reframe our understanding of fables? Folk art has often been neglected in the story of British art but a new exhibition at Tate Britain attempts to set that right with a range of items from pictures woven from human hair to ship's figureheads and quilts made by Crimean prisoners. British ...