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The History of Art in Three Colours, BBC Four

Fisun Güner Thursday, 26 July 2012

It’s a patchy history, the history of art told through the colour gold, though I suppose it would be. After all, despite the title of this new three-part series, we’re not actually talking about gold as colour, that seductively warm, buttery yellow of Italianate landscapes and Turner sunsets, but of gold itself. Actual gold. The Impressionists never used it, but those ancient Egyptian tomb builders did, and so did medieval icon painters.

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Twenty Twelve: The Finale, BBC Two

Ismene Brown Wednesday, 25 July 2012

So that’s all over then. Which isn’t good. The gnawing anxiety for followers of Twenty Twelve, the programme whose theme song is “There may be trouble ahead...", has been whether real-life events would become so like it - or even worse, more like it than it could be - that the programme would become redundant.

Line of Duty, Series Finale, BBC Two

Adam Sweeting Wednesday, 25 July 2012

At the end of episode four, we left ferret-faced copper Steve Arnott (Martin Compston) seemingly having his fingers hacked off with a bolt-cutter by a gang of hooded thugs and their poisonous little child-sidekick, Ryan. Boringly, the glum and dislikeable Arnott was rescued in this finale when the supposedly corrupt DCI Gates organised a police rescue, and got away with all his fingers mostly intact.

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Tom Daley: Diving for Britain /Absolutely Fabulous, BBC One

Adam Sweeting Tuesday, 24 July 2012

Jane Treays's previous film about diver Tom Daley was 2010's The Diver and His Dad, which followed the amphibious teenager as he sat his GCSEs and defended various titles. Ominously, it also charted the progress of his father Rob's struggle against a brain tumour.

Storyville: The Queen of Africa - The Miriam Makeba Story, BBC Four

Peter Culshaw Tuesday, 24 July 2012

We had Kevin MacDonald’s Bob Marley epic documentary earlier this year, and this is a similar film about another artist who became a symbol as much as a singer. I only saw Miriam Makeba in her sixties, by which time she had become a revered institution they called Mama Africa, as though she was the mother of an entire continent. This Storyville documentary took us back the amazing vibrancy and courage of her early years, with some terrific archive footage.

Arena: Amy Winehouse - The Day She Came to Dingle, BBC Four

Lisa-Marie Ferla Monday, 23 July 2012

The first anniversary of Amy Winehouse’s death seems like both a temptation and an opportunity for a sensationalist, hyperbolic tribute. Refreshingly, this Arena film, which told the story of the night that a superstar in the making performed to an 85-capacity church in the Irish fishing village of Dingle, for the most part avoided the clichés: the word “tragedy” wasn’t even mentioned until 38 minutes in.

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The Hollow Crown: Henry V, BBC Two

Matt Wolf Sunday, 22 July 2012

Forget the ages-old talk of London buses arranging their schedules so that they all arrive at once. The capital's patterns of public transport have nothing on the rapidity with which Henry V has hoved into view of late, whether at Shakespeare's Globe, on tour from the all-male Propeller company, in repertory at Islington's Old Red Lion pub theatre or as a baleful conclusion to the BBC's impressive Hollow Crown series of the Bard-on-film.

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Natural World: Living with Baboons, BBC Two

Jasper Rees Thursday, 19 July 2012

It’s as well to be ready. There will come a time when our civilisation may enter a period of darkness which will be known, self-explanatorily, as After Attenborough. May it not arrive any time soon, or even ever. But if, or more likely when, it does, it won’t matter anyway because we’ll have already spit-roasted most species into extinction, as Sir David has been direly warning these past few years.

Usain Bolt: The Fastest Man Alive, BBC One

Adam Sweeting Tuesday, 17 July 2012

"What caused him to be so fast? Is he here for a purpose?" wondered Usain Bolt's father, Wellesley, in a mystical tone. Usain's mother, Jennifer, also seems to detect the workings of a higher power in her son's blindingly rapid progress around the world's running tracks. "Thank you, Lord, for what you have done," she said.

The Hollow Crown: Henry IV Part 2, BBC Two

Matt Wolf Sunday, 15 July 2012

One intends no discredit to the keenly judged monarch-to-be that is Tom Hiddleston's Prince Hal, who will reappear on the small screen next weekend carrying the story forward in Henry V, to point out that Richard Eyre's terrific BBC adaptation of Henry IV Part 2 was stolen by dad.