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Carlos Ghosn: The Last Flight - Storyville, BBC Four review - the tycoon who fell to earthThursday, 15 July 2021![]()
The extraordinary story of motor industry executive Carlos Ghosn is a heady combination of power, money, corruption and international politics, with a Mission: Impossible-style ending that carries it over the finishing tape in dramatic style. It might be considered a cautionary tale, except that Ghosn’s experiences and personality were so unique that a repeat performance could never happen. Read more... |
Sex/Life, Netflix review - Mills & Boon for the YouPorn era?Tuesday, 13 July 2021![]()
Has Netflix succeeded in reshaping Mills & Boon for the YouPorn era? Read more... |
Ghislaine Maxwell: Epstein's Shadow, Sky Documentaries review - the iniquitous fall of the tycoon's daughterFriday, 02 July 2021![]()
Last year, Netflix released Jeffrey Epstein: Filthy Rich, a four-part documentary about the notorious financier and convicted sex offender. Read more... |
Framing Britney Spears, Sky Documentaries review - the rollercoaster ride of the former teen iconThursday, 24 June 2021![]()
She became one of the most successful pop stars in history, but Britney Spears has also become a paradigm of the horrors and pitfalls of life in the white heat of showbusiness. Read more... |
Physical, Apple TV+ review - too much pain, not enough gainTuesday, 22 June 2021![]()
It’s not easy to sum up Physical in a pithy soundbite, though “quasi-political misanthropic comedy” might be vaguely in the right ballpark. Read more... |
BBC Cardiff Singer of the World 2021 Final, BBC Four review – an embarrassment of vocal richesMonday, 21 June 2021![]()
A massive musical hope for the future is what we all need right now, after 14 stop/semi-start months and a threatened decimation of the concert and opera scene, the danger of which isn't over yet. Read more... |
Loki, Disney+ review - the God of Mischief gets his own TV seriesThursday, 17 June 2021![]()
After appearing in six of Marvel’s Avengers movies, Tom Hiddleston’s Loki (the God of Mischief) gets his own TV series. Read more... |
Lupin, Part 2, Netflix review - master of disguise versus racists and liesSaturday, 12 June 2021![]()
Lupin isn’t really about the fictional character it’s named after (the gentleman thief Arsène Lupin, created in 1905 by French writer Maurice Leblanc), but about Assane Diop, who’s an obsessive fan of the Lupin novels. Read more... |
The Beast Must Die, Britbox review - a crime story which plumbs psychological depthsThursday, 10 June 2021![]()
They all laughed when the streaming service Britbox declared that it wanted to become a sort of UK-orientated Netflix, because so far it’s been mostly a back catalogue operation which plunders the BBC and ITV archives. You really want to pay a subscription to watch Are You Being Served? and Rosemary and Thyme? Read more... |
Time, BBC One review - grim and gritty study of life behind bars by Jimmy McGovernMonday, 07 June 2021![]()
Jimmy McGovern’s new three-part drama about prison life is about as far as you could travel from Ronnie Barker’s Seventies sitcom Porridge, even if they are both on the same TV channel. 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.
It followed some...
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Last night was the first time I had heard the 12 Ensemble, a string group currently Artist-in-Residence at the Wigmore Hall, and I was very...
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On walking into Mikalene Thomas’s exhibition at the...
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Mezzo-soprano Helen Charlston just gets better and better, both as singer and as actor. Last night’s recital at Temple Church had an unusual and...
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Microtonic comes into focus on its third track, “Infinity Peaking.” Album opener “Goit,” featuring a guest vocal by Working Men’s Club’s...
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At the age of 83, Martha Argerich contains more personality in...
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Myra Hess was one of the most important figures in British cultural life in the mid-20th century: the pre-eminent...
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Sebastian Copeland’s images of the Arctic may look otherworldly – with their tilting cathedrals of ice, hypnotic light, and fractured seascapes...
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An album is one thing, a live show is another. A truism of course, but one which is inescapable during this London date by the Rotterdam-based...
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Rehab people will tell you there are three stages to drug abuse: fun; fun with problems; problems. There’s also a fourth phase, where there aren't...