Reviews
Suzanne Vega, Barbican HallWednesday, 17 October 2012
This year it’s been all about 50th anniversaries. If 1962 was a cultural foundation stone, it’s unlikely that 1987 will inspire quite so much in the way of plaques and bunting. It is, however, 25 years since Suzanne Vega released her definitive... Read more... |
FrankenweenieWednesday, 17 October 2012
Who knew that Tim Burton remaking himself would, in effect, bring him back to creative life? Of three highly anticipated horror-based "family films" released this Halloween season, Burton’s Frankenweenie would seem like the rank outsider. A stop-... Read more... |
Imagine: Freddie Mercury - The Great Pretender, BBC OneWednesday, 17 October 2012
This film, promised Imagine's host Alan Yentob, would be "the nearest we'll get to the real Freddie Mercury, a shy man in search of love and a driven artist living behind the protection of his stage persona". Probably true, but the shyness and the... Read more... |
Red Velvet, Tricycle TheatreWednesday, 17 October 2012
Wow, what a lot of debuts. Adrian Lester (Hustle, Bonekickers, Merlin) makes his Tricycle Theatre debut in this new play about a black actor in Regency London, and it’s written by his wife, the actress Lolita Chakrabarti. The play is her first... Read more... |
LFF 2012: EverydayWednesday, 17 October 2012
Michael Winterbottom’s Channel 4 commission for a film on prison life resulted in this five-year experiment in the passage of time for jailed Ian (John Simm) and his young family left on the outside. The oldest of the four child actors was almost... Read more... |
LFF 2012: The HuntTuesday, 16 October 2012
Featuring a towering, Cannes-award-winning performance from Mads Mikkelsen, The Hunt (Jagten) is a humane and horrifying story of the power of accusation from Danish director Thomas Vinterberg (Festen).Mikkelsen plays Lucas, a kindergarten teacher... Read more... |
Johnny Hallyday, Royal Albert HallTuesday, 16 October 2012
The Royal Albert Hall is pretty big. It's a prestige venue, but everything is relative. For the overwhelmingly French audience, the first British headlining show by Johnny Hallyday was the equivalent of seeing Paul McCartney, Tom Jones and Cliff... Read more... |
Ginger & RosaTuesday, 16 October 2012
The latest film from innovative firebrand Sally Potter is something of a surprise given her back catalogue. Her last feature, Rage (2009) premiered on mobile phones and the internet and comprised a series of to-the-camera monologues; the one before... Read more... |
Wonderland: Walking With Dogs, BBC TwoTuesday, 16 October 2012
If you asked a bunch of foreigners to describe the British, I bet one of the phrases most frequently used would be “a nation of dog lovers”, so it was no surprise to discover that film-maker's Vanessa Engle's latest bulletin about the British and... Read more... |
LFF 2012: The SapphiresTuesday, 16 October 2012
A film about an Aboriginal soul quartet in the Vietnam War should at least have originality covered. This adaptation of the hit Australian musical by Tony Briggs based on his mum and aunt's Saigon adventures rings most changes, though, in being a... Read more... |
5 Broken CamerasTuesday, 16 October 2012
A story of six years of conflict in the West Bank set against more timeless details of life in the Palestinian town of Bil’in, 5 Broken Cameras brings the reality of resistance to the expansion of Israeli settlements – a conflict between unarmed... Read more... |
Downton Abbey, ITV1: Death of Lady SybilMonday, 15 October 2012
You suspected she was a goner the moment the doctors started to front up like King Kong and Godzilla. Having given birth to a girl, the rebellious bluestocking Lady Sybil got her marching orders last night on Downton Abbey and Jessica Brown Findlay’... Read more... |
