Arts
Every scene Sophia Loren isn’t in feels like a wasted one: The Life Ahead reviewed
The Life Ahead stars Sophia Loren, and if there is one reason to see The Life Ahead it is this:…
Is The Undoing properly great or just a run-of-mill thriller with a brilliant casting director?
There must be some people somewhere who vaguely know their own spouses — but if so, they don’t tend to…
Rebecca
Imagine daring to make another version of Rebecca. Hitchcock’s 1940 film is the version that is bound to overshadow any…
Neil Armfield’s Dream
Benjamin Britten’s setting of Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream is an outstanding achievement. In Australia, we have experienced two exceptional…
'We're all members of the Stasi now': Irvine Welsh interviewed
The arts are everywhere under attack from those who claim offence, writes Nina Power. Irvine Welsh steps into the fray with a documentary on the new censorship
Has Spitting Image ever been funny?
Thank you, Spitting Image, for the nostalgia trip! Your new series on BritBox has rekindled with almost Proustian fidelity those…
You won’t be able to look away: Shirley reviewed
This week, two electrifying performances in two excellent films rather than two mediocre performances in the one mediocre film —…
Finally a lockdown drama that will endure: James Graham's Bubble reviewed
Theatres can open if they want to. That’s the current position. The only factor keeping a playhouse dark is a…
One of the greatest of all outsider artists: Alfred Wallis at Kettle’s Yard reviewed
Alfred Wallis (1855-1942) should be an inspiration to all late starters. It was not until he had passed the age…
A new opera that deserves more than one outing: Royal Opera's New Dark Age reviewed
It’s quite a title sequence. Puccini swells on the soundtrack and words flash before your eyes. ‘Ecstatic!’ ‘Spellbound!’ ‘Passionate!’ ‘Dazzled!’…
One of the few genuine British visionaries at work today: Richard Dawson at the Barbican reviewed
How hard must it be to make music that sounds like no one else? And how unrewarding, often, as well?…
Orson Welles
The journals of the plague year from the point of view of culture are getting weirder and weirder from Daniel…
Opera Australia’s Attila before shutdown in March
Attila the Hun might have been hard to stop but Verdi’s opera Attila was stopped in its tracks at the…
A cautionary tale about how democracy can subvert itself: Bunga Bunga reviewed
Italy has long captivated romantics from rainy, dreary, orderly northern Europe. Goethe, Stendhal, Keats and Shelley all flocked to Italy…
You're not going to get a better spin on bromance – brobably: The Climb reviewed
The Climb is, essentially, a bickering bromance as two longtime pals bicker bromantically down the years, and it doesn’t sound…
Enough plotlines to power several seasons of The West Wing: BBC1's Roadkill reviewed
Like many a political thriller before it, BBC1’s Roadkill began with a politician emerging into the daylight to face a…
There’s a magic to hearing music in such small audiences: Divine Comedy reviewed
Three shows in a week! Why, it was just like the first week of March. There was, however, little of…
The mix of slapstick and sermonising is certainly original: In Bad Taste reviewed
In Bad Taste is a slapstick comedy about five female terrorists who murder the governor of the Bank of England.…
Entertaining – but there's one abomination: National Gallery's Sin reviewed
Obviously, we’re living through an era of censorious puritanism. Granted, the contemporary creeds are different from those of the 16th…
The genius of stop-motion wizard Ray Harryhausen
Claudia Massie explores the cinematic majesty and mind-bending visual trickery of stop-motion wizard Ray Harryhausen
Too much of nothing
In the world of the arts, some things keep on even in this time of impossibility which the virus has…
Josh Frydenberg
There has been a fair bit of bleating from sectors claiming to have been ignored in the Budget; in fact…
A beautiful radio adaptation: Radio 4’s The Housing Lark reviewed
Nineteen fifty-six: the Suez crisis, the first Tesco, Jim Laker takes 19 wickets in a match. But also: Trinidadian pianist…
A high-end car-boot sale of the unconscious: Colnaghi’s Dreamsongs reviewed
In 1772 the 15-year-old Mozart wrote a one-act opera set, like The Magic Flute, in a dream world. Il sogno…
Is AppleTV's Tehran the new Fauda?
If you love Fauda — and of course you do — you’re in for a long wait for season four,…
