Film, TV & Book Reviews

The Diplomat opens with a bang — literally. Minutes into the two-season series, a British aircraft carrier is bombed off the coast of Iran, killing dozens of sailors and triggering an ...

‘You weren’t supposed to suddenly get a new family at eleven o’clock on a Saturday after you’d sold out of eggs.’ So much of Kevin Wilson’s ...

In an era dominated by sequels, trilogies, franchises, reboots and prequels, getting an original idea greenlit is next to impossible. Today, product recognition is everything. If audiences can’t instantly ...

Zero Day is an American political thriller, in which Robert De Niro stars as former US president George Mullen, who is called out of retirement and given free rein in ...

Featuring a musical performance by Lady Gaga, a surprise drop by Adam Sandler and a soaring stock, Netflix wrapped up this year’s TUDUM show – the streaming behemoth’s annual ...

By Philippa Tracy On a recent trip to Dublin I picked up a copy of Amongst Women by John McGahern, considered his finest novel and described by some as a ‘...

An asylum seeker caught in between lands, jobs and mountains of paperwork. Sounds familiar? It’s a story we’ve heard all too often in the past few years, and ...

Of the many ways in which I unintentionally broadcast my lack of coolness to the world, the one we’ll talk about this week is my blind and rabid excitement ...

Netflix’s latest true-crime docuseries Cold Case: The Tylenol Murders peels back the sealed lid on one of America’s most terrifying unsolved cases. This three-part series, out on Monday, ...

There are a lot of people who, typically as a result of their own ignorance, tend to dismiss philosophy as navel-gazing solipsism. The immediately flippant counter to these people is ...

Last week, we peeled back the curtain on some of Hollywood’s myths regarding movies. From behind-the-scenes shenanigans (including actual assault) to misconceptions about legendary improvisations, it turns out you ...

Eccentric detective and avid birdwatcher Cordelia Cupp is called to the White House during a state banquet to solve the murder of the chief usher. Binoculars in hand, she proceeds ...

By Philippa Tracy Who was Eileen O’Shaughnessy? She is perhaps better known as the first wife of writer George Orwell (Eric Blair). In a particularly burdensome moment of what ...

The IMDB trivia page is a fascinating place, where one has the rare chance to take a sneak peek at what’s happening behind the scenes of each movie. Not ...

Netflix’s The Four Seasons, co-created by Tina Fey, turns Alan Alda’s 1981 film into a smart, eight-part series about the ups and downs of long-term friendship and marriage. It ...

George Eliot describes marriage as both a ‘bourne’ and ‘a great beginning’ at the end of Middlemarch, in which we see examples of marriages as both endings and beginnings. Kate ...

Love to see movies with badass sword fights where the protagonist literally cannot die? Netflix has you covered with the 2020 hit Old Guard, a movie where an immortal group of ...

North of North centres on the struggle of a 26-year-old woman to find her own way in life after realising her (not so happy) marriage and being the mother of ...

‘What would you write if you had to write your obituary? Today, right now.’ Avid readers of this column (I’ve always wanted to write this, but don’t worry; ...

Finding an audience is by far the hardest thing a film can achieve these days. There is a deluge of content on TV and cinema and breaking through the clutter, ...

Did you know what makes an excellent plant fertilizer? Corpses, apparently. Elmer, an assassin leading a generally mundane life as a gardener, knows all about it. In the Netflix show ...

By Philippa Tracy I was hooked before I opened the book. I read a review in which the writer said that if she owned a book shop, she would, “hand-sell ...

Asterix and Obelix: The Big Fight OK. This is a bit of cheating, as this one premieres on April 30, but I couldn’t help myself! I adore Asterix and Obelix ...

A new series airing on Sigma TV has rightly captured the attention of viewers. Corazón Guerrero, a soap opera of Mexican origin, weaves a compelling narrative of broken families, ...