tv
Manhunt, Apple TV+ review - all the President's menTuesday, 19 March 2024
President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated on 14 April 1865, five days after General Robert E Lee’s surrender at Appomatox signalled the end of the American Civil War. The ensuing chase to catch his killer, John Wilkes Booth, is the basis of Manhunt (based on James L Swanson’s book). Read more... |
The Gentlemen, Netflix review - Guy Ritchie's further adventures in GeezerworldTuesday, 12 March 2024
Welcome back to Guy Ritchie’s Geezerworld, familiar from such slices of lurid villainhood as Lock, Stock…, RocknRolla and The Gentlemen (the movie). The Gentlemen (the TV series) takes some cues from the similarly-named big-screen event from 2019, but becomes its own distinctive self as it unwinds across eight episodes. Read more... |
Oscars 2024: politics aplenty but few surprises as 'Oppenheimer' dominatesMonday, 11 March 2024
Oppenheimer as expected dominated the 96th Academy Awards, winning seven trophies whilst runner-up Poor Things took four prizes, including Emma Stone in the hotly contested category of best actress. Read more... |
Prisoner, BBC Four review - jailhouse rocked by drugs, violence and racismThursday, 07 March 2024
The notion of prison as a pressure cooker of human behaviour and emotions is hardly a new one, but it can provide formidable fuel for drama. It does so here in this ferociously gripping Danish series, which hails from the same production company as The Killing and The Bridge. Read more... |
Drive to Survive, Season 6, Netflix review - F1 documentary overtaken by eventsTuesday, 27 February 2024
When the first season of Drive to Survive launched on Netflix in 2019, it was greeted with suspicion by some in the Formula One paddock. But with its sixth season now up on Netflix, just ahead of next weekend’s 2024 season-opening race in Bahrain, the show can congratulate itself for having helped to bring about a revolution within Formula One. Read more... |
The Way, BBC One review - steeltown bluesTuesday, 20 February 2024
This three-part drama arrives trailing clouds of big-byline glory. Michael Sheen directed and produced it (as well as making fleeting appearances on screen), James Graham wrote it and documentary-maker Adam Curtis co-produced it. Read more... |
Kin, Series 2, BBC One review - when crime dynasties collideMonday, 19 February 2024
The end of the first series of Kin found Dublin’s Kinsella crime family ridding themselves of bloodsucking drug baron Eamon Cunningham, but this was not an unalloyed blessing. As this second series opens, the Kinsellas are having to make new arrangements with the Batuks, the Turkish family who are the source of all the local drug supplies. Read more... |
The New Look, AppleTV+ review - lavish period drama with more width than depthThursday, 15 February 2024
The frocks, the pearls, the chicest branding of any perfume in the world… Sorry, this is not what The New Look is about, for those who swooned at the V&A’s recent Chanel exhibition. Read more... |
Griselda, Netflix review - Sofía Vergara excels as the Godmother of cocaine traffickingSunday, 04 February 2024
When Colombian drug potentate Pablo Escobar made his comment that “the only man I was ever afraid of was a woman named Griselda Blanco,” he ensured that Ms Blanco would achieve immortality in the annals of crime. Netflix’s new series about Blanco, starring and produced by Sofía Vergara, claims to depict Blanco’s life “as faithfully as possible”, though that famous line “when the legend becomes fact, print the legend” feels a bit nearer the mark. Read more... |
The Traitors, Series 2, BBC One review - back to the mind-labyrinthSaturday, 27 January 2024
Asking whether there could be an end to melody given only 12 notes to work with, Sergey Prokofiev compared the possibilities to a chess game: “for the fourth move of the White there will be about 60 million variants.” Read more... |
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It all started on 09/09/09. That memorable date, September 9 2009, marked the debut of theartsdesk.com.
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