tv
Digging the Great Escape, Channel 4Tuesday, 29 November 2011
The archaeological documentary is becoming the obligatory format for tackling legendary tales of the British at war. Someone seems to recreate the Dam Busters raid every six months, the wrecks of battleships HMS Hood and the Bismarck have been tracked down in the ocean depths, and Time Team have excavated various subterranean artefacts from the Western Front. Read more... |
Living With the Amish, Channel 4Friday, 25 November 2011
The life-swap doc comes in sundry guises. Emissaries of simpler cultures visit our broiling cities to gawp at streets swimming in fresh spew and rivers of piss every Saturday night. Alternatively our lot pop off to places where people shit in holes and praise the Lord. Whichever way the story gets sliced, it’s always about the same thing: holding up a mirror to ourselves and not tending to like the view. Read more... |
Searching For Summertime, BBC FourThursday, 24 November 2011
It’s a song which hangs in the air like pollen or reefer smoke, before gradually rising like a never-to-be-answered prayer. It began life as a lullaby but grew up to be a protest song, a scream of existential angst and even a purred invitation to sex. Read more... |
The Café, Sky1Thursday, 24 November 2011
To start a new sitcom with 18 seconds of unbroken silence after the opening music has faded is a brave move. Such minimalism is not to everyone's taste and some viewers may switch off there and then, but others will recognise it as the calling card of minimalist comedy, which is unafraid of silence or indeed inaction. Read more... |
Ian Hislop: When Bankers Were Good, BBC TwoWednesday, 23 November 2011
There were those who laughed and those who spat outrage when Lloyd Blankfein, chairman of Goldman Sachs, said in a press interview that he was simply “doing God’s work”. Read more... |
Britain's Greatest Codebreaker, Channel 4Tuesday, 22 November 2011
I had misgivings before watching Britain's Greatest Codebreaker last night on Channel 4: the advertised mix of drama and documentary tends to send a signal that neither half is sufficiently well done. And within a minute, it was clear that this was such a chimera: over-dramatic voiceovers for the documentary part, Ed Stoppard acting to the back row in the drama part. Read more... |
The Killing II, BBC FourSunday, 20 November 2011
People speak to her. It could be her mother. It could be a colleague. But she doesn’t react, continues what she’s doing. Which, usually, is leaving. It’s welcome back to Sarah Lund, whose watchability is in inverse proportion to her demonstrativeness. As recalcitrant detective Lund, in the second series of Denmark’s The Killing, Sofie Gråbøl is as magnetic as the first time around, whatever she’s wearing. Read more... |
Janet Jackson – Taking Control, BBC FourSaturday, 19 November 2011
How do you forge a pop career in the shadow of the biggest pop star on the planet? What is perhaps forgotten about Janet Jackson is that not only did she pull this off, but for a while she actually overshadowed her older brother. Read more... |
Pan Am, BBC TwoThursday, 17 November 2011
This is a very odd series. Even the BBC seem to be wondering what on earth they're supposed to be doing with it, since after the Wednesday night airing of these first two episodes Pan Am is moving to Saturday evening, with a Thursday repeat. Read more... |
Who Do You Think You Are? USA: Steve Buscemi, BBC OneThursday, 17 November 2011
Steve Buscemi says he’s “from the country of Brooklyn”. In the wake of Boardwalk Empire he could have said the empire of Brooklyn. Although the family history disinterred was genuinely strange, this first entry in the new series of Who Do You Think You Are? USA was no emotional roller coaster, mostly because of Buscemi’s low-key affability. Read more... |
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