Italy
SuburraMonday, 20 June 2016
An underage prostitute dies from a drug overdose at a mini “bunga bunga” party with a high-ranking politician. When that’s one of a film’s less shocking moments, you know you’re in for a bumpy ride.With its steady stream of killings, maimings,... Read more... |
Tale of TalesFriday, 17 June 2016
The earliest known versions of Rapunzel and Cinderella appeared in an Italian compendium of fairytales known as the Pentamerone. They were collated by Neapolitan courtier Giambattista Basile and published in the 1630s after his death. The 50-strong... Read more... |
Ben Building: Mussolini, Monuments and Modernism, BBC FourThursday, 02 June 2016
One can only speculate about the mysterious allure which dictators seem to hold for Jonathan Meades, and perhaps one should keep one's conclusions to oneself to avoid reprisals. Having previously turned his perverse eye and tumultuous vocabulary on... Read more... |
Revolution and Romance: Musical Masters of the 19th Century, BBC FourWednesday, 01 June 2016
Suzy Klein, writer and presenter of this three-episode series, is a trained musician and a ubiquitous presence in cultural programmes across a wide spectrum. This opening film, "We Can Be Heroes", was an engagingly populist piece about a complicated... Read more... |
Cavalleria Rusticana, Pagliacci, Welsh National OperaFriday, 27 May 2016
Seventy years ago, almost to the month, Welsh National Opera took to the stage for the first time with a double bill of the terrible twins, Cavalleria rusticana and Pagliacci; and fifty years later the company celebrated with the same two works... Read more... |
DVD: YouthTuesday, 10 May 2016
The fountainhead of creativity is at the heart of Paolo Sorrentino’s English-language follow-up to the Oscar-winning The Great Beauty. The film is set in a Swiss hotel-cum-sanatorium whose summer residents include Michael Caine as a composer who... Read more... |
Il Vologeso, Classical Opera, Cadogan HallFriday, 29 April 2016
A mere 10 minutes in to this concert performance of an 18th century delight by Neapolitan Niccolò Jommelli, you knew the form to expect for the rest of the evening. Ian Page's Classical Orchestra kicked off with bracing rhythmic vitality from the... Read more... |
Leonardo da Vinci: The Mechanics of Genius, Science MuseumTuesday, 01 March 2016
Was Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), who straddled the arts and science in such a unique way, several hundred years before his time? Did the painter-inventor-engineer really draw the prototypes for, inter alia, the aeroplane, the motor car, the... Read more... |
Il Trittico, Royal OperaFriday, 26 February 2016
From working-class hell via convent purgatory to Florentine comic heaven, the riches of Puccini's most comprehensive masterpiece seem inexhaustible. In a production as detailed in its balance between the stylised and the seemingly spontaneous as... Read more... |
Botticelli and Treasures from the Hamilton Collection, Courtauld GalleryTuesday, 23 February 2016
In Hell, the souls of the damned endure cruelly imaginative punishments for all eternity. Corrupt churchmen are buried headfirst in the ground with their feet set on fire, and soothsayers, who in life presumed to be able to see into the future, have... Read more... |
Norma, English National OperaThursday, 18 February 2016
In the light of what follows, it's probably best to be clear that I'm completely behind the artistic side of ENO in rejecting a 25 per cent reduction of the chorus's annual salary, tied to a shorter season. A full-time chorus of this size is the... Read more... |
The Renaissance Unchained, BBC FourTuesday, 16 February 2016
Waldemar Januszczak always has a provoking agenda to shape his now nearly countless forays into television art history. In this four-part series he's out to challenge what he sees as the unthinking acceptance of the one-dimensional traditional and... Read more... |
