Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

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colinr0380
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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1076 Post by colinr0380 » Thu Sep 24, 2020 3:21 am

There is also that rather strange situation going on with BBC4 doing a 'classic film season' at 8 p.m. on Thursday nights. Last week was Casablanca, tonight it is Doctor Zhivago and next week North By Northwest (EDIT: It is rather amusing that Casablanca climaxes with forcing someone to get on an airplane and North By Northwest involves someone trying to avoid it!). According to the trailer A Star Is Born is going to screen as well, presumably the Judy Garland version given the timeframe of the rest of the films in the schedule. (I think it would be far too daring for this season to go as far back as 1937 or into the Streisand 1970s!)

So that is quite nice to see, but the strange thing about it is that all of these films are being shown on BBC2 on the preceding Sunday afternoon as well! Which kind of thoroughly undermines the trumpeting of this being a "BBC4 season" in the trailers, especially because BBC2 does not have a DOG-tag in the corner of the screen all of the time making it by far the better and cleaner way to watch any of the films! I suppose that BBC4 does have a couple of Talking Pictures episodes to tie into each film following their screening as a small compensation.
Last edited by colinr0380 on Thu Oct 01, 2020 5:04 pm, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1077 Post by colinr0380 » Thu Sep 24, 2020 2:45 pm

Also, even for the baroque titles of TV movies the one showing on Channel 5 on Thursday 1st is quite astonishing, being called Adopt Me Or I'll Kill You! It goes under the more blandly mundane title Mommy Be Mine on imdb, although imdb notes that it has been released in France under the juicier title!

It is quite difficult to keep up with the interchangeable on a theme titles of some of these TV movies. For instance I had to do some surprisingly in depth research to figure out if Stalked By My Husband had been shown on television before, only to realise it has been under the title Escaping Dad! That's "Stalked By My Husband", which is a different film from "Stalked By My Doctor", "Stalked By My Ex", "Stalked By My Husband's Ex", "Stalked By My Mother", "Stalked By My Neighbor", "Stalked By My Patient", "Stalked By My Doctor: The Return", "Stalked At 17", "The Stalker Club", "Stalked By A Reality Star" and the mind-bendingly titled "Stalked By My Doctor: Patient's Revenge"!

Only about half of those were directed by Doug Campbell and star Eric Roberts.
Last edited by colinr0380 on Mon Sep 28, 2020 5:18 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1078 Post by Roger Ryan » Thu Sep 24, 2020 4:48 pm

colinr0380 wrote:
Thu Sep 24, 2020 2:45 pm
...Only about half of those...star Eric Roberts.
Of course he got his start with this sort of thing at the top, co-starring in Bob Fosse's Star 80! At least Roberts is still collecting a paycheck.

EDIT: I just checked Roberts' imdb.com listings and he's really ramped up his projects recently: 122 roles wrapped so far since the beginning of 2019 (and that includes about six months of a pandemic shutdown in the TV/Film industry)!

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1079 Post by thirtyframesasecond » Fri Sep 25, 2020 5:34 pm

Atlanta was amazing. I can't wait to watch the B.A.N and Teddy Perkins episodes again.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1080 Post by thirtyframesasecond » Fri Sep 25, 2020 5:35 pm

Eric Roberts is a mainstay of (usually) hip-hop videos.

https://medium.com/@BAFeldman/these-are ... 128eed8491

Big fan of Mariah's 'We Belong Together'.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1081 Post by domino harvey » Fri Sep 25, 2020 5:57 pm

thirtyframesasecond wrote:
Fri Sep 25, 2020 5:35 pm
Eric Roberts is a mainstay of (usually) hip-hop videos.

https://medium.com/@BAFeldman/these-are ... 128eed8491
This is the quality internet content I am always looking for but rarely finding

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1082 Post by jlnight » Sat Sep 26, 2020 4:39 am

Hot Enough for June, Fri 2nd Oct, London Live.

The Day of the Locust, Sat 3rd Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Thu 8th Oct. Or...
Yardie, Sat 3rd Oct, BBC2.

The Searchers, Sun 4th Oct, BBC2.
Teacher's Pet, Sun 4th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Thu 8th Oct.

The Brides of Fu Manchu, Tue 6th Oct, Talking Pictures. (been on before)
Article 15 (2019), late Tue 6th Oct, Channel 4.

The Box (2009), Wed 7th Oct, Sony Movies.


Sky Arts is now on Freeview. Not spotted any significant feature films yet.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1083 Post by colinr0380 » Sat Sep 26, 2020 7:06 am

domino harvey wrote:
Fri Sep 25, 2020 5:57 pm
thirtyframesasecond wrote:
Fri Sep 25, 2020 5:35 pm
Eric Roberts is a mainstay of (usually) hip-hop videos.
https://medium.com/@BAFeldman/these-are ... 128eed8491
This is the quality internet content I am always looking for but rarely finding
Perhaps we should add an "Eric Roberts Honourary Mention" in the Music Videos List Project for all those actors who appear in music videos! Also I really like the implication in that "We Belong Together" video that Mariah Carey is easy to spot in a crowd because while she may have long left the scene that there is still a gigantic dress trailing behind her!

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1084 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Sep 30, 2020 3:42 pm

Pretty quiet next week. The big film involves Kenneth Branagh and his crazy moustache in the remake of Murder on the Orient Express on Channel 4 at 8 p.m. on Sunday 4th. Only three months after showing the first film ITV2 just cannot wait and have The Nut Job 2: Nutty By Nature scheduled for 5 p.m. on Saturday 3rd. One of them features a large star cast and apparently a plethora of fart gags, but which one could it be? Could it possibly be all of them?

jlnight has noted the other two premieres of interest in Yardie, directed by Idris Elba and showing on BBC2 at 9.45 p.m. on Saturday 3rd; and Channel 4's Indian film season continuing with Article 15 at 1.30 a.m. on Wednesday 7th.

And, um, the Horror channel is showing Selfie From Hell at 9 p.m. on Friday 9th (who would have thought that worst thing about the Dark Net involved taking selfies?) and FirstBorn at 9 p.m. on Sunday 4th.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1085 Post by colinr0380 » Thu Oct 01, 2020 11:03 am

Also the Radio Times get a bit snippy in their listing for Loveless, getting repeated on Film4 at 1.10 a.m. on Thursday 8th:
Radio Times wrote:Russian director Andrey Zvyagintsev's mastery of mood wins out over his incipient sexism in this portrait of a disintegrating marriage

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1086 Post by jlnight » Sat Oct 03, 2020 5:05 am

Boot Hill, Thu 8th Oct, Sony Movies Action.

Carrie (1976), Fri 9th Oct, Film4. Or...
Friends (1971), Fri 9th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Tue 13th Oct.

Warp Speed, early Sat 10th Oct, Talking Pictures.
Blueprint for Robbery, Sat 10th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Thu 15th Oct.
Sidney Sheldon's Bloodline, Sat 10th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also late Sat 24th Oct.
Lost in London, starts Sat 10th Oct, London Live.

GI Blues, Sun 11th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Fri 16th Oct.
Rough Cut (1980), Sun 11th Oct, Talking Pictures. Or...
Scanners, Sun 11th Oct, Horror. Or...
The Guardians (2017), Sun 11th Oct, BBC4.

Skate Kitchen, Mon 12th Oct, Film4.

Abigail's Party, Wed 14th Oct, BBC4.

Summer and Smoke, Thu 15th Oct, Talking Pictures.
Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush, Thu 15th Oct, Sony Movies Action.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1087 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Oct 07, 2020 2:04 pm

Really interesting next week. jlnight has already noted all of the key films, but I'll add some trailer links.

BBC4 is showing the most interesting film of the week with French First World War drama The Guardians at 10.30 p.m. on Sunday 11th.

BBC4 is also showing the first of the two most recent episodes of the Inspector Montalbano showing at 9 p.m. on Saturday 10th. And the channel is also celebrating the Play For Today series that ran on the BBC between 1970 and 1984 (to tie in with the BFI season and the Blu-ray release celebrating the 50th anniversary) with the 90 minute documentary Drama Out of a Crisis on Monday 12th at 9 p.m. Whilst jlnight has noted that BBC4 are inevitably showing the most famous of the series, Mike Leigh's Abigail's Party on Wednesday 14th at 9 p.m., even more exciting is a showing of the Richard Eyre directed Country at 10.30 p.m. on Monday 12th. Though if you cannot wait it is available here.

The other premieres of note are Skate Kitchen showing on Film4 at 11 p.m. on Monday 12th. Which looks a bit like a glossier, feminist Larry Clark film from the trailer(?) Channel 4's Indian film season continues with Raazi at 2.10 a.m. in the early hours of Wednesday 14th.

Lots of interesting repeats as well. Probably the most important is Ken Loach's My Name Is Joe showing on Film4 at 1.30 a.m. on Friday 16th, which is the first time that film has been shown on UK television in seven years. ITV1 is showing Raging Bull at 11 p.m. on Saturday 10th, and ITV4 is showing Starship Troopers at 11 p.m. on Monday 12 and 9 p.m. on Wednesday 14th. Film4 is also showing Force Majeure at 1.40 a.m. on Monday 12th and Swedish film Call Girl at 1.10 a.m. on Wednesday 14th.

But I am most impressed by the 5 Star digital channel next week which has a whole raft of fun films showing throughout: Erin Brockovich on Saturday 10th; Anaconda (I still fondly remember Barry Norman highlighting in aghast horror the moment of Jon Voight's character leering at a semi-clad Jennifer Lopez when he reviewed it on Film 98!) and Thir13en Ghosts on Sunday 11th, Scream on Wednesday 14th, Scream 2 on Thursday 15th and the Renny Harlin shark thriller Deep Blue Sea on Friday 16th!

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1088 Post by thirtyframesasecond » Wed Oct 07, 2020 3:55 pm

I don't remember Anaconda all that well, besides it being enjoyable crap. Nice diverse cast too; Voight, Lopez, Stoltz, Ice Cube, Owen Wilson - who would cast them together?

Luis Llosa also directed The Specialist, which is even more enjoyable crap. Cousin of Maria Vargas Llosa and uncle of Claudia Llosa, who made the excellent The Milk of Sorrow.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1089 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Oct 07, 2020 4:29 pm

There is also a film showing on the Horror channel at 9 p.m. on Tuesday 13th which has captured my curiosity: Samantha Morton, Michael Shannon and Peter Fonda in the first theatrical film in over a decade from John McNaughton, director of Henry: Portrait of a Serial Killer called Can't Come Out To Play (aka The Harvest in its original US title)

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1090 Post by colinr0380 » Thu Oct 08, 2020 4:40 pm

The latest Film4 trailer has shown that Climax will be coming up on the channel at some point in "Autumn", which when it happens will be the first Gaspar Noé film to show on UK television since Carne and Seul Contre Tous got shown in 2000 back when Film4 was a monthly subscription channel.

EDIT: And Shoplifters is upcoming as well.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1091 Post by jlnight » Sat Oct 10, 2020 10:45 am

White Riot (LFF 2019), Fri 16th Oct, Sky Arts.

Islands in the Stream, Sat 17th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Mon 19th Oct.
Child's Play (1972), Sat 17th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also late Sun 25th Oct.

The Greatest Showman, Sun 18th Oct, Channel 4.
The Holcroft Covenant, Sun 18th Oct, Sony Movies Action. Or...
Detroit, Sun 18th Oct, BBC2.

The Game (1997), Mon 19th Oct, Sony Movies.

Been So Long, Tue 20th Oct, Film4.
A Hole In Babylon (Play For Today), Tue 20th Oct, BBC4. (followed by I Am Not Your Negro)
Naal (2018), late Tue 20th Oct, Channel 4.


Summer and Smoke has been pulled.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1092 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Oct 14, 2020 4:15 pm

A lot of things next week with the three big premieres being quite eclectic with Kathryn Bigelow's musical drama Detroit on BBC2 at 10 p.m. on Sunday 18th, the searing true story drama involving drawing up contracts The Greatest Showman on Channel 4 at 7 p.m. also on Sunday 18th (I am rather surprised that they would not save it until the Christmas schedules, but it will probably be repeated then), and the celebration of diversity with content warning of a few brutal beatings by authoritarian figures Fifty Shades Darker showing on Channel 5 at 10 p.m. on Friday 23rd.

As jlnight has noted the Indian film season continues on Channel 4 with Naal at 2 a.m. on Wednesday 21st. And in a nice turn of events BBC4's Play For Today season continues into next week with Horace Ové's production A Hole In Babylon showing at 10 p.m on Tuesday 20th, although that clashes up against Film4's one premiere of the week with Been So Long at 9 p.m.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1093 Post by jlnight » Sat Oct 17, 2020 2:58 pm

The Captive City (1951), Fri 23rd Oct, Sony Movies Action.
7th Cavalry, Fri 23rd Oct, Film4.
Suzi Q, Fri 23rd Oct, Sky Arts. Or...
Red Line 7000, Fri 23rd Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Mon 26th Oct.

A Star is Born (1954), Sat 24th Oct, BBC2.
The Great Gatsby (1974), Sat 24th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Tue 27th Oct. Or...
Apostasy, Sat 24th Oct, BBC2. Or...
The Brood, Sat 24th Oct, Horror.

Going Ape! (1981), Sun 25th Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Tue 27th Oct.
Darling Lili, Sun 25th Oct, Talking Pictures.

Feels Good Man (Storyville), Mon 26th Oct, BBC4.

The Prisoner (1955), Tue 27th Oct, Sony Movies Action.
Just a Boys' Game (Play For Today), Tue 27th Oct, BBC4.
St Agatha, Tue 27th Oct, Film4.
Videoman (2018), late Tue 27th Oct, Film4.

Beware, My Lovely, Wed 28th Oct, Talking Pictures.

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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1094 Post by colinr0380 » Mon Oct 19, 2020 4:44 am

knives in Awards Season 2017 thread wrote:
pandroid7 wrote:The Greatest Showman seems like the most Baz Luhrmann movie that isn’t actually made by Baz Luhrmann.
I really hope it doesn't win so I don't feel any obligation to watch it in this life.
I watched The Greatest Showman on television last night despite feeling much the same way as the posters above and surprisingly quite enjoyed it. It definitely is in the tradition of Baz Luhrmann with its very modern tunes occurring in a very period setting but with a couple of major differences that endeared it to me a bit more than Moulin Rouge! did. The first is that whereas Moulin Rouge! was full in your face artifice from start to finish the really 'heightened reality' CGI moments in The Greatest Showman are mostly confined to the bookending opening and closing circus numbers, where the trapeze artist flies just a bit higher than air, the tigers are even closer to the audience than they would ordinarily be (and are perfectly choreographed) and the elephants are doubled and performing, as with the tigers, in perfect symmetry with each other. The inherent unreality of CGI is used to give something 'bigger than life' that kind of captures the (hucksters?) dream of what could be rather than the struggle of what is in the rest of the film.

The second is that although it is in the tradition of Luhrmann in the fusion of modern song style and period it is much more of a standard film musical for most of its duration. It is nowhere near as frantic in tone (outside of the 'playing to the crowd' bookends) and the camerawork and editing is nowhere near as headache inducing! It was actually quite refreshing to see an 'actual musical' with, you know, choreography and little bits of business expressing developing character behaviour in the musical numbers (such as in the central ballad between Carlyle re-wooing his love interest after another lady catches his eye) rather than entirely relying on visual spectacle to power a song before getting back to the plot in the 'talky bits'. Here every song is both a break from the physical action of the film for singing and dancing, but the singing and dancing is where the internal, emotional aspect of the characters is given the room to shine. That feels like a very 'old school' way of doing a musical, where the external plot stops for the internal life to take the reigns but both are pushing the action forward, though I remember Chicago doing a little bit of the same thing a couple of decades ago, though I think only really successfully in that one John C. Reilly "Mr Cellophane" number.

And the third difference is that it is an inherently joyous film compared to Moulin Rouge!'s rather depressing La Boheme-styled take on shattered dreams and lives cut short once all of the hyper-natural trappings and pop song medleys have been stripped away (probably why Moulin Rouge! made a good pairing with the similarly depressing tale told in obscuringly over frantic terms Romeo + Juliet). With The Greatest Showman I was really nervous about how Michelle William's 'long suffering wife' character would be handled when she appeared, and whilst it is kind of a standard archetype of the wife at home complaining about the husband being obsessed with his work (and thereby making a busy situation an even more unnecessarily complicated for the harried husband trying to juggle everything at once), I did really love the way that she was blissfully happy from the very start of the film just being in love and together and gets to consistently make the very good points about not needing to quest for more and more fame and kudos when he has everything he needs to be content already.

So what could have simply been the 'nagging wife' character is shrewdly written to be loving and supportive but cruelly ignored, and I particularly love the moment of the break up where sweet Charity tells Barnum that she is not upset at him mortgaging their house but that he had not told her. That she would have said yes and had always wanted to be a partner in all of their journeys through life, but he had been cutting her out of his life with the focus on the international tour with Jenny Lind, and incidentally in doing that endless tour forcing her into the role of stay at home mother to look after their children.

It is difficult to properly explain but I particularly liked the way that the film paired up moments, such as Barnum's new assistant from a privileged background Philip Carlyle re-wooing his love interest (and giving up all of his wealth and privilege for love) after having his head briefly turned by the spectacular character of the singer Jenny Lind, which anticipates the turn that Barnum himself does into being obsessed with her, not romantically but for what she can do for his status in high society. Or the way that in managing Jenny Lind Barnum both abandons his real family of his wife and daughters as well as his ersatz family he has built up of the performers, both of them feeling disregarded and undervalued as Barnum tries to improve his status. And I particularly love that beyond the bookending celebratory circus performances that the film begins and ends with the lyrics being quietly spoken by Barnum - at the opening it is all about self-aggrandisingly being the ringmaster engendering a sense of anticipatory awe for the spectacle to come in the audience but at the end Barnum himself is in the watching audience watching his daughters perform and quietly speaking the final lines to his wife, content with his status in society and in some ways to have passed the torch (and burden?) of performing on to the new generation.

(Although yes, that does make it yet another film in which Hugh Jackman plays someone stepping down from their headlining role. It seems as if he has been trying to retire in films for longer than he has been the leading man by this point!)

The Jenny Lind figure is kind of the siren character of the film: stunning beauty, amazing voice, captivating to both audiences and the money men alike. In some ways she is the most monstrous character of the film, vampirically draining the resources of her managers to fund her endless singing tours (where she stands alone in a spotlight, everyone's focus entirely on her, unlike the ensemble of the circus where the performers haphazardly pile out into the ring in an unruly, exuberant mass) and calculatedly destroying Barnum with a kiss off at their last performance.

This fits in with the grander themes of the film, of not just the difference between outward beauty and unconventional 'freaks' but about ambition (but solitary, cold and ruthless) against family (where as long as you can all get by together and keep performing, that is the main thing). They are pretty obvious contrasts but I thought that the film handled them really well, especially the intercutting between the audience in rapturous applause at Jenny's performance and the elements in the audience for the circus yelling insults at the freaks (as well as Barnum watching Jenny in joy whilst Carlyle is upset at the abuse occurring), all done in silence.

But in the end it comes down less to the external corrupting figure of Jenny Lind but more the internal drives and flaws within Barnum himself. The neglect and abuse he suffered on the streets as a child fostering the drive within him to succeed and attain more and more status, as if desperate to keep proving himself to people who never cared about him before, and never will however high he climbs in society. After 'claiming' Charity from her father, which is where Charity is happiest, he needs to keep attaining more to prove himself 'worthy' of being able to mingle in high society. Even after he has created a successful enterprise in the freakshow and has a loving family, there is still the need to go further, because those things are not what will impress the outside world. In fact running a freakshow and having a family tying him down might even be seen as a liability to a successful, 'respectable' career. But the pursuit of ever grander dreams brings his empire crashing down, both in financially bankrupting him and in not being there for his real family and business.
___

While I did very much enjoy the film, and it entirely succeeds at what it sets out to do and the story that it is intending to tell (which is really the main thing, and I can entirely understand why this became as big of a 'feel good' hit as it did) I think I do have a number of reservations as well. Mostly that I still feel a bit uncomfortable with the beautiful vs unconventional looking aspect to the film. I think this film is 'empowering' and 'diverse' but in a way that could be argued to be still rather contained and 'safe'. I am not arguing that the film should be 'cancelled' or anything as drastic as that I hasten to add, but I do think that this is a good example of a film celebrating 'diversity' whilst still within a rather conventional framework. A conventional framework that is probably part of its box office success, but it is kind of about 'safe' tolerance within already tried and tested boundaries (plus in a period set film, where these issues can arguably be safely contained within a less contemporary context) rather than 'unsafe' tolerance that might surprise or confront an audience with much beyond the way that bearded ladies, midgets, giants or guys with full body tattoos are people too, and hey they mustn't be all that bad if they can belt out showstopping tunes!

A lot of this aspect is downplayed in the film but it is pretty obvious that the radiant (too radiant) beauty of Jenny Lind is meant to contrast both with the performers that Barnum has previously been the manager of as well as of his neglected wife herself. But the 'dilemma' (if we should even call it that) of Barnum giving up his management of Lind to return to his neglected business and wife is rather undermined by his wife being stunningly beautiful as well! There could never be any doubt or sense of disappointment in anyone's mind about returning to Michelle Williams! Although to be fair Barnum was never romantically infatuated with Jenny, it was more about unthinkingly replacing Charity as 'business partner' with Jenny. I think actually the film goes a bit too far the other way in the ending of Barnum retiring from his ringmaster role to become a full time family man, when really all Charity wanted was to be a full partner with him in the business of both home and work, but I presume that the implication is that they will both continue to have strong behind the scenes managerial roles rather than being front of stage performers anymore, that baton passed across to Philip Carlyle and Anne Wheeler in their business sphere, and to their ballet performing daughters in the family one.

I think where the biggest issue with the film turns up is the romance between Carlyle and Wheeler which brings in elements of an interracial romance. That is not particularly an issue in itself but I did find it rather strange that Anne Wheeler and her brother have quite different skin tones, with the actor playing the brother being a lot darker than the actress playing Anne. Was that meant to be a way of making this relationship 'more acceptable' to the audience? But that aspect did make it amusing that this romance is played out rather perfunctorily within 'safe parameters' with the standard tried and tested scenes of on the one hand Anne's brother being suspicious of Philip's motives (especially when he briefly eyes up Jenny), and on the other Philip's parents being appalled that he would bring Anne to a swanky play and disowning him for his transgressive behaviour in coming to the production arm in arm with "the help". I was just left thinking how truly wonderfully transgressive it would have been if Philip had fallen for the darker skinned brother and had brought him to meet the parents instead!

And on that note of playing things safe, really this does all boil down to two white benefactors providing a voice to the disenfranchised and a 'safe space' for everyone to inhabit (despite one of them neglecting it, bankrupting everyone and letting the place get burnt down! But hey, he's a white guy so he deserves a second chance with a loan from the profits that the other white guy (pretty much his more youthful doppleganger) squirrelled away!).

But asking for those elements to have been changed or accommodated is probably asking for a much different film from the intentions behind this one! I guess what I was wanting was for the John Waters version of this story! (Or even arguably a Tim Burton one, although more the wide-eyed romantic Ed Wood era Burton than the more recent one that would have likely meant Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter in high Gothic form as the Barnums and even more ker-razy CGI everywhere)

And this is probably the biggest nitpick of all but whilst I loved the content of Zac Efron's final speech as Carlyle to Barnum, I wish he had inflected it a bit differently. Efron plays it all pretty un-nuanced but if he had played up the first part of the speech standing in the timbers of the burnt wreckage of the theatre where he seems indignant about Barnum's behaviour and what he has personally lost because of it with a bit of played up faux anger it really would have made the final part of that speech when he says that however he has gained so much more from his friendship with him hit all the stronger. I still teared up a bit at that moment despite myself, but I probably would have been sobbing more if Efron had done a bit more of an emotional turn there.

Anyway I suppose above all it was really nice to finally find out what the origins of the big top were! I had always assumed it was because it was just because it was easy to put up and take down again and move around the country with, but apparently it is something to do with stopping angry mobs from causing as much damage when burning the fabric tenting down as they did with the previous building, as well as something to do with getting around having to deal with expensive land taxes and building permits (I do wish they had added an extra musical number or two about those issues!)
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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1095 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Oct 21, 2020 2:15 pm

A ton of stuff next week, partly because Film4 (and a couple of other channels) are building up to Halloween. jlnight has noted a lot but I'll add the trailer links too.

I think I am most excited about Apostasy, the Jehovah's Witness drama showing on BBC2 at 10 p.m. on Saturday 24th (Andrew Collins in the review section of the RadioTimes makes an interesting point that something was going on at the time with a few searching 'inside minority religious community' films with First Reformed and Disobedience all coming out at around the same time).

BBC4's latest 'world television' series occupying the 9 p.m. slot on Saturday 24th is the French/Danish series DNA. Charlotte Rampling is apparently in the cast although from the TV listings she will not be in the first two episodes. Nicholas Bro is though, and BBC4 has a Nicholas Bro themed night on that evening as they are currently halfway through repeating the third series of The Bridge in double bills, in which he also appears! (That actor might be currently best known at the moment for the role as the commuter who becomes the subject of the bet in Lars von Trier's Nymphomaniac Volume I)

BBC2 has been showing the Enslaved with Samuel L. Jackson series on Sunday evenings for the last few weeks at 9 p.m. and on Sunday 25th the final episode immediately gets followed by Loving at 10 p.m.

BBC4's Storyville documentary series is showing Pepe The Frog: Feels Good Man at 10 p.m. on Monday 26th. And the channel is still continuing with repeats of older Play For Today programmes with Just A Boy's Game at 10 p.m. on Tuesday 27th, which is the last film that John Mackenzie directed for the series (different from his film in the upcoming BFI set) in 1979.

With barely enough time for the bruises to fade after the previous installment, Channel 5 is following up Fifty Shades Darker with Fifty Shades Freed at 10 p.m. on Friday 30th.

Channel 4's Indian film season continues with Hamid at 2 a.m. in the early hours of Wednesday 28th.

But Film4 goes into overdrive next week with their annual Halloween horror film season. Among repeats of A Quiet Place, mother!, The Descent and Train to Busan they are also premiering:

St Agatha at 11.30 p.m. on Tuesday 27th, in a double bill with Videoman at 1.40 a.m.
The Secret of Marrowbone at 11 p.m. on Wednesday 28th
Cold Skin at 11.25 p.m. on Thursday 29th

ITV2 gets in on the horror film action as well with Tim Burton's Dark Shadows getting premiered at 6.45 p.m. on Sunday 25th (it is quite a Tim Burton week as The Corpse Bride is showing on ITV2 earlier that day and then Channel 4 is showing Big Eyes at 2.15 a.m. on Thursday 29th, albeit in a sign language version), and then surprisingly showing It Chapter One at 9 p.m. on Friday 30th. (I am not linking to a trailer for that one as spooky clowns scare me)
Last edited by colinr0380 on Tue Nov 03, 2020 7:46 am, edited 2 times in total.

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domino harvey
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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1096 Post by domino harvey » Thu Oct 22, 2020 8:24 pm

Serious question: What is the logic of showing sign language rather than forced subtitles?

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colinr0380
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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1097 Post by colinr0380 » Fri Oct 23, 2020 1:34 am

I guess in vision sign language is just considered to be another option for those who find subtitles too distracting or difficult to follow along with, as well as presumably being the method of communication that deaf people might be more familiar with in their everyday lives.

The majority of programmes already have optional hard of hearing subtitles that can be turned on at any time anyway (The "888" button on Teletext was the big thing before digital came in, though it required a dedicated and more expensive television. This is probably incredibly nerdy but one of the highlights of my annual holiday to visit my grandparents in Bristol back in the late 80s and early 90s was the chance to get to explore Teletext on their TV!). Sign language programming was a trend that really took off in the mid 2000s. The BBC created a "Sign Zone" on BBC2 late every evening that repeated their main channel programmes again overnight and a couple of the other channels followed suit, especially Channel 4, but with the twist that rather than taking the BBC approach of repeating things in a sign language version to accommodate everyone Channel 4 just sign languaged their overnight output without providing any 'clean' screening as well.

Unfortunately the late night-early morning period was where Channel 4 showed most of their interesting programming too, and their films. So it pretty much wrecked the content of the channel, at least during the mid-2000s when Channel 4 were broadcasting a range of material. (Not that it was a huge title but I particularly remember early on the premiere of Meg Ryan boxing film Against The Ropes being only shown in a sign language version, and that has never been shown on UK television since that time at all. The same with Spike Lee's Bamboozled. So it was sign language or nothing for those. Or, you know, buying them on DVD. But it was kind of astonishing to have one's first experience of Bamboozled be with a sign language presenter performing some of the same actions, especially during the minstrel shows, in the corner of the screen, like a parody of a parody!). Now that Channel 4's spin off digital channels E4, More4 and Film4 are where anything even slightly niche goes and Channel 4's overnight output is mostly sign language versions of Hollyoaks and makeover shows (or films like Big Eyes that get occasional clean showings on Film4) it is not too much of an issue any more. Though I see at the moment Channel 4 is repeating the US series This Is Us (previously shown on More4) in a late night sign language version.

Progammes specifically aimed at the deaf community, particularly the BBC's See Hear show, would do everything all at once: subtitles, audio description and sign language, though that often would get a bit busy! One of the big benefits of digital is that hopefully channels could then be dedicated to specific needs. I did note recently that there are audio description services now on the BBC with a press of a button and have always thought it would be a much better idea to have a specific sign language oriented channel dedicated to that content.

___

A rant about scheduling follows:

I had a bit of antipathy towards the sign language block back in 2006-7 for 'ruining' late night television because of that, particularly on Channel 4 (with no room left for stranger and more esoteric shows, and no ability to do freeform debate shows such as those on the After Dark series because there needed to be a specific cut off time for the sign language block of programming to run) but it did not particularly matter after a few years, and especially by 2010 or so when it became clear that there was not really any particular interesting content left to get 'ruined', especially on Channel 4 as almost everything film-related (aside from the Indian film season and the big primetime blockbuster films) migrated to Film4 instead. That is also why, whilst I still gripe about the DOG-tagging of Channel 4 as unnecessary, it would have been a much worse issue back in the 90s or early 2000s than it is now (Channel 4 actually did attempt DOG-tagging very early on for a few months in 1996, and unfortunately screened Guy Maddin's Careful, as well as Baraka during that time and never again since).

I would like to think that whoever schedules films on Channel 4 is well aware that they should put a 'clean' version of their films onto Film4 if they are showing it on Channel 4 too, as everything shown in a sign language version in recent years, including Big Eyes, turns up from time to time on Film4 as well. The big films shown on Channel 4 with DOG-tags (like Murder on the Orient Express or Greatest Showman recently) will probably appear on Film4 cleanly in a few months. Really the only thing affected badly by Channel 4's DOG-tagging now is the Indian film season, where those films only ever get a single television screening.

It is a bit of a chicken and egg situation where having to have the midnight to 6 a.m. slot blocked out for repeats of primetime shows and sign language programmes could have been argued to have destroyed Channel 4's vibrant late night programming. But it could be argued that Channel 4's vibrant late night programming was already being destroyed by years of livestreamed Big Brother in that timeslot already, and the sign languaging of the few remaining films was just the final nail in the coffin for the channel.

It was similar though less extreme for the BBC. Their "Sign Zone" block is the remaining legacy of a period in the early 2000s when BBC2 was really into 'zoning' everything into ghettoised enclaves. So there was the "History Zone" on Saturday evenings, the "Comedy Zone" on Friday nights, the "Learning Zone" (which the Sign Zone basically replaced) which was overnight educational programmes for schools, and even an attempt at an "Arts Zone" on Sunday evenings (which kicked off with that Will Self interview with Mike Leigh which is on the Criterion edition of Naked). All of the other Zones fell away but the Sign one stayed. I would say that it nixed the prospect of the occasional all night seasons of films (such as the magnificent
Halloween night
one back in 1992 or the "Weird Night" in 1994), but they rarely occurred anyway and the Learning Zone had pretty much already put a stop to that long before the Sign Zone got there.
Last edited by colinr0380 on Wed Feb 21, 2024 3:53 pm, edited 6 times in total.

jlnight
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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1098 Post by jlnight » Fri Oct 23, 2020 7:33 am

I think that British Sign Language (BSL) is not a direct translation of written English (subtitles). I remember reading posts on another forum where there was a user who had a particular, bizarre posting style. Other users took the mickey out of him... until he revealed that he was profoundly deaf and was brought up using BSL. The different grammar and style accounted for the posts which looked like English was not their first language, which it wasn't.

One consequence of in-vision signing is if it is applied to inappropriate material, for example a film like Sex Lives of the Potato Men, which I think I saw on Channel 4 with the interpreter in the corner of the screen frantically gesturing to keep up with the on-screen antics! That was more entertaining than the film itself. I may have imagined that though.

There was a brief period when the old BBC Knowledge channel on Sky (which morphed into BBC4) screened some non-English films without any subtitles at all! I think it was part of a push to link it with their foreign language courses that they showed on the channel. I'm pretty sure Bunuel's Viridiana was one of the films!

jlnight
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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1099 Post by jlnight » Fri Oct 23, 2020 8:50 pm

Re-Animator, Fri 30th Oct, Horror.
Children Shouldn't Play with Dead Things, late Fri 30th Oct, Talking Pictures.

The Band Wagon, Sat 31st Oct, BBC2.
Is Paris Burning?, Sat 31st Oct, Talking Pictures. Also Fri 6th Nov.
Make Up (LFF 2019), Sat 31st Oct, BBC2.
Perfect Skin (2018), Sat 31st Oct, London Live.
Secret Rites, late Sat 31st Oct, Talking Pictures.

Fear Strikes Out, Sun 1st Nov, Talking Pictures. Also Mon 2nd Nov.
Happy End, Sun 1st Nov, BBC4.
Blue Velvet, Sun 1st Nov, Film4.
Beatriz at Dinner, Sun 1st Nov, BBC2.

The Children Act, Mon 2nd Nov, BBC2.
Realm of the Damned, late Mon 2nd Nov, London Live.

Murders in the Rue Morgue (1971), Tue 3rd Nov, Sony Movies Action.
Leeds - United! (Play For Today), Tue 3rd Nov, BBC4.


Also on Sat 31st Oct:
Halloween (1978) and They Live, Film4.
Halloween II and Halloween III: Season of the Witch, Horror.

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colinr0380
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Re: Upcoming Movies on TV (UK)

#1100 Post by colinr0380 » Wed Oct 28, 2020 4:28 am

Pretty good next week too. Unfortunately however three premieres and episodes 3 & 4 of BBC4's DNA series all clash together on Saturday evening with BBC2 showing Make Up at 9.45 p.m. (which I am the most interested in), Channel 4 showing Blockers at 9 p.m. and Film4 showing Breaking In (the modern day remake of Fight For Your Life? EDIT: It turns out that this is pretty much a remake of Panic Room) also at 9 p.m.!

jlnight has noted the best film night of the week is Sunday 1st with another clash of premieres with Beatriz At Dinner on BBC2 at 11 p.m. and Michael Haneke's Happy End on BBC4 at 11.20 p.m. Which group of bourgeoisie will discreetly charm you on that evening? They all also clash with the rare repeat of Blue Velvet over on Film4 at 10.45 p.m.

BBC2 is showing The Children Act at 9 p.m. on Monday 2nd (which looks like public and private are getting a bit too intertwined for comfort, or proper ethical behaviour, from that trailer), and also on Monday 2nd Channel 5 has the sci-fi horror film Life at 11 p.m.

BBC4 is still continuing with Play For Today dramas with Colin Welland's Leeds United! at 10 p.m. on Tuesday 3rd. And Channel 4's Indian film season continues in the early hours of Wednesday 4th with My Pure Land at 2.10 a.m.

I am very excited to see that E4's Adult Swim block is beginning to show the latest animation series from the creator of Samurai Jack, Genndy Tartakovsky, Primal, at 1.30 a.m. in the early hours of Friday 6th, along with the next series of The Jellies! (I should also note that after its sweep at the Emmys E4 has belatedly started showing Schitt's Creek from the very beginning too, rather than relegating it to the subscription only 4Music channel as it had been doing for the previous few years).

And..um...ITV2 is showing Suicide Squad at 9 p.m. on Friday 6th. (I'm not linking to a trailer for that one because spooky clowns scare me)
Last edited by colinr0380 on Fri Nov 06, 2020 4:33 am, edited 2 times in total.

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