Over the past few weeks I've seen and heard some brilliant work, so I thought I'd share the highlights.
Peter Moffat's The Village is the best thing the BBC has offered in a long, long time. I was left speechless after almost each of the six episodes. To cut a long and complicated story short, The Village is going to be a huge project depicting life in the same village over the course of almost one hundred years, as seen through the eyes of Bert Middleton. It is supposed to be the British answer to the German drama Heimat. This first series was set during WWI and tackled pretty much every issue under the sun from class wars, to conscientious objection, to mental illness. The acting was simply phenomenal. People were down on the series in the beginning, claiming it was too depressing for Sunday night but life's not always a party, particularly during wartime. The loyal fans stuck with it and we were rewarded with a work of art that will no doubt be watched for many years to come. I for one hope the BBC show the final episode again this Remembrance Sunday.
I don't know much about the Kennedy's but I remembered reading something about this documentary on Lainey Gossip at some point, so when it came on Sky Atlantic I taped it for a later date. I finally watched it a few weekends ago and was blown away. It was a very inspirational and poignant documentary and Rory Kennedy's love for her family and admiration for her mother was palpable. I am now on the look out for a good biography on Ethel and Robert Kennedy.
Last weekend, I made my way down to Sundance London. I didn't see any of the films on offer but made sure I was there for this talk. It was much busier than I expected but then once inside they asked how many present were composers and at least 1/3 put up their hands, so that was understandable. David Arnold (Stargate is one of my all time favourite themes and it was amazing to hear him explain pitching the sound as Lawrence of Arabia in space because it is!) talked about his life and discussed some of his more famous works such as Independence Day and James Bond. Overall, it was a fascinating talk and interesting to hear about the process of composing for film.
Looking forward to...
I haven't been to the theatre in a while so I am hoping to get tickets for:
- Merrily We Roll Along at The Harold Pinter Theatre (thanks to The Reece Malcolm List I want to check this one out)
- Sweet Bird of Youth at The Old Vic
- Macbeth in Manchester (starring Kenneth Brannagh and Alex Kingston. Tickets are currently sold out but where there's a will, there's a way!)
What have you been watching/listening to lately?
