tv
Against the Law, BBC Two review - uplifting and deeply movingThursday, 27 July 2017
The thing almost no one remembers about the great Nora Ephron/Rob Reiner 1989 romcom When Harry Met Sally is that the love story is intercut with real couples talking to camera about the mechanics and longevity of their true-life loves. It shouldn’t work, but it does. Remarkably, Fergus O’Brien’s deeply moving BBC film Against the Law, armed with far darker material, pulls off the self-same trick. Read more... |
Diana, Our Mother: Her Life and Legacy, ITV review – intimate revelations from William and HarryTuesday, 25 July 2017
The death of Princess Diana 20 years ago had an extraordinary emotional effect on millions of people who had never met her, so what on earth must it have felt like for her two young sons? Prince Harry, aged 12 when his mother died, reflected on that in this much-anticipated programme. Read more... |
It's So Easy and Other Lies, Sky Arts review - uneven rock bio outstays its welcomeSaturday, 22 July 2017
Duff McKagan is a survivor. He’s a bass player too, from the fledgling Seattle punk/proto-grunge outfit 10 Minute Warning to the stadium-filling behemoth of Guns N’ Roses, but if you were judging by the narrative weight of this 2015 documentary, you’d have to conclude that he’s mostly survivor. Read more... |
Fearless, Series Finale, ITV review - big build-up to an anticlimaxTuesday, 18 July 2017
It was a coup by ITV to get Homeland writer Patrick Harbinson to pen this paranoid-conspiracy series, and rather droll to get Helen McCrory (wife of Homeland’s Damian Lewis) to play the lead. Read more... |
Game of Thrones, Series 7, Sky Atlantic review – slow, but it's just the beginningTuesday, 18 July 2017
If nothing else, Game of Thrones has surely been the greatest boon to the British acting profession since they invented tights and greasepaint. Part of the fun is trying to think of somebody who hasn’t been in it yet. Read more... |
I Know Who You Are, BBC Four review - preposterous but hypnoticMonday, 17 July 2017
All’s fair in love and law in I Know Who You Are. BBC Four’s latest Euro-import hails from Spain and, as per the channel’s practice, is coming at you in intense double doses, two 70-minute episodes every Saturday night. Read more... |
Orange Is the New Black, Season 5, Netflix review - counterpoint in a three-day prison riotFriday, 14 July 2017
Rippling outward from the initial story of a seemingly nice WASP woman who finds herself having to adapt in a women's prison, Orange Is the New Black quickly developed into the most multilayered, almost indigestibly rich of American TV dramas. Read more... |
GLOW, Netflix review - not quite comedy or dramaThursday, 13 July 2017
How much plotting went into GLOW? It has been gussied up by the people who brought you the jumbo Netflix hit Orange Is the New Black. Both shows are based on a true story and feature women of all ethnicities bitching and slapping in a contained environment. In Glow there’s less orange, and less black, but even more bitching and slapping. Read more... |
In the Dark, BBC One review - missing girls mystery promises hidden depthsWednesday, 12 July 2017
Detective Inspector Helen Weeks (MyAnna Buring), having finally cornered a skanky drug-dealer/benefit cheat in a blind alley – and stopped an eager PC from Tasering the woman – is punched in the stomach for her pains. How’s that for a hard-hitting start? Read more... |
Grandad, Dementia and Me, BBC One review - no easy solutions to terrifying mental conditionWednesday, 12 July 2017
The title gave us the true-life plot: this was a grandson’s filmed narrative of something that will touch us all, through acquaintance, friend, family and perhaps ourselves falling victim to some form of dementia. It's a word that covers a myriad of conditions, all of them affecting the mind. Read more... |
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