You never can tell...

These days it's not quite so bad, because there's often the chance of chasing things up on catch-up, but there's still moments when the choice of "what to watch" seems crucial. Last night, for instance, I watched the first half of Liverpool v. Borussia Dortmund. Yes, alright - as the inane commentators kept insisting - the atmosphere was potent, but after forty-five minutes Liverpool had let in two goals and it was time for Line of Duty. So I switched across, and missed one of the greatest comebacks since Istanbul - yes, also Liverpool, also European competition, also scoring unbelievable numbers of goals in a desperate second half. So I should have stayed where I was, particularly since Line of Duty - whisper it; I think Jed Mercurio is great - is not a patch on series 1 and 2. Too contrived, too familiar (Craig Parkinson, as another crooked policeman, again?), just missing the originality and edge that made it such a pleasure.   

The Night Manager

I occasionally moan about the quality of TV, so this is a good time to say actually, we're being spoilt. Decent, varied quality drama. Happy Valley and The night Manager just finished, but The A Word and Line of Duty underway. All - so far, at least - worth watching.

The Night Manager has been terrific. Not exactly total le Carre - I can't remember any book of his ending as happily as this series does - but honest enough to the complexity of the politics, and terrifically acted. Production values and cinematography on the level of cinema, and totally gripping all the way through. A treat to watch. 

Inside Obama's White House

The Norma Percy juggernaut rolls on. she's the documentary producer who provides almost instant history, interviewing everybody that matters and then presenting it in a clear account, covering all the angles but not offering any kind of smug summary or slanted commentary. Detailed, meticulous reporting, which makes you feel you were there.

She's done it for former Yugoslavia, Arab-Israeli tension and probably many others I've forgotten, but the current series is an account of the Obama Presidency. And it breaks your heart. We always knew there were missed opportunities, commitments that weren't kept, but to replay in detail how chances were missed, how narrowly odds fell against him, is really sad. Worst of all is the tightening confidence of Republicans, that their role is simply to oppose and destroy, that there is no issue on which it might be sensible to make a judgement in the interests of the country as a whole. and if you feel that way, it's not that astonishing you should end up with a candidate like Donald Trump. 

Happy Valley

What a series. I caught Happy Valley 1 late, saw it all on catch up in a couple of days, squeezed in before going on holiday. So this time I was ready. I've watched each episode, every week, marvelling at the writing, the acting, the sheer bloody intelligence of it all. Somehow the threads were finally tied up tonight without the usual ludicrous straining or cheating, and there were a couple of scenes of pure poetry. Sarah Lancashire's police officer gently cradles a woman who's just shot her son, while she gently, ever so gently, cautions her. Then she tries to talk down a police colleague who's set on killing himself, but she makes a mess of it, and asks him to help, because he knows about that sort of thing. In summary, both scenes sound ludicrous, flights of fancy which couldn't possibly work. On screen, they were riveting.l  

Good news about BT

I know. I never thought I'd write that. and i'm sure there'll be days i'll be cursing them again, whether about the phone or internet connection. but this week at least, I think they're great. I signed up for BT sport because i got fed up with the adverts saying that this was "free to BT customers" when in my case it wasn't. and as it happened, i needed a more powerful signal, and some complicated kit, and a bump in what I was paying, before I could actually connect.

But on this week's evidence, it's a bargain. At the weekend I watched two gripping rugby matches, Leicester v. Northampton and Toulon v. Bath. and then tonight, utterly stunning, I saw every minute of the rainswept, error-strewn magnificent 3-3 draw between Liverpool and Arsenal. Just amazing.  

Capital

First we had records, then tapes, and then CDs. black and white TV, then colour, then video recording, and now catch-up. I am gradually learning the art, having ditched my complicated system of recording on to tape or DVD. Now I don't record anything, but I do try to catch up on stuff I've missed, because of clashes, or being out, or people telling me that things i didn't think were worth watching might actually deserve a look.

Capital was one of these. i read the book, with mild pleasure but no great enthusiasm, but it's actually one of those few works which gains from being televised. It was long and sprawling, with Middlemarch pretensions but nothing like its depth, but Telly knows how to zip around between the members of a large cast, maintaining interest through variety and suspense, and wrapping the whole thing up in less than three hours - which the book certainly didn't manage. entertaining, very watchable, and I polished off all three episodes in one night. Job done. 

Cartel Land

Sometimes there seems to be nothing to watch on TV, but you think "Oh well, give it a go..." and that's how i ended up watching Cartel Land, a stunning documentary on BBC4. It looks like standard fare; gritty portrait of both sides of the US/Mexico border, chronicling the grief that follows from the cartels' trade in drugs and mirgants.

But it's much, much cleverer than that. It shifts between two groups of vigilantes, apparently unconnected. The US rednecks who see it as their duty to patrol the border, since the government seem to have given up. And then there's the resistance movement in small Mexican towns, challenging the cartels' domination of their lives, and taking up arms because the government seem to have given up...

Early on there's that contrast, between backwoods reaction and courageous defiance, but as the story proceeds the lines get increasingly blurred, and confident judgements get undermined by the passage of time, betrayal and the power of the cartels, not to mention human nature at its frailest. don't take my word for it. Watch it while you can. 

Schama on Portraits

It's funny how TV creates the impression of relationships. I feel I know Simon Schama and Alan Yentob. superficially similar types - middle aged Jewish intellectuals, enthusing about the arts. but they couldn't be more different. I love watching and listening to Schama, partly because he really scares about the stuff he's looking at, partly because he's a writer with a feel for words. As you listen, you think "I wouldn't mind reading this." His current series on portraits is just brilliant. Flashing about in time, flitting between very different societies, and also digging up real gems that I've never seen before - this is the series which might well make me visit the exhibition, and then buy the book.

And then there's Yentob. There was a programme on Shylock the other night I didn't watch, just because it was him. To me, he seems self-important and assertive, as though what he's saying is more important than what he's talking about. that may be wildly unfair, and other viewers might well react in opposite ways - Schama's all too easy to caricature. but for me, the choice is very clear.    

This Is England 90

Finally, I've caught up with the whole of the last series of This is England - thanks to catch-up TV. not sure whey I wasn't able to watch it as it came out, but these days that's not the problem it was. It's a strange addictive series, which doesn't work quite like anything else. If you watched the wrong five-minute clip, you could easily think it's aimless and inconsequential. In fact, it's an intelligent, affectionate portrait of a complex group of working-class people, and there's not often you'll hear that.

It's acted with total conviction, by actors like Stephen Graham and Vicky McLure, who've moved on to bigger and more respectable things, but are bright enough to know that never again will they be involved with something that has this weird mix of silliness, affection and raw power. No spoilers, just go and watch it. Give it time. 

Bake-Off

Yes, I know. Never dreamed I'd be watching it, let alone writing about it, but there you go. My daughter's at home and hardly watches anything, but this is a regular fixture, so i might as well be sociable...I don't make cakes and never shall, but I have to admit, it's riveting. Cleverly edited, so that it's almost all highlights. No drudgery, no total disasters (this is the final, after all) but plenty of tension and suspense. It's also very civilised - there's an acknowledgement that the art of baking is the star, so that although there are judges and personalities and we get to know the contestants, it's within a shared appreciation of a common passion - miles away from the phony competitiveness and self-assertion of The Apprentice or Britain's Got Talent. (Not that I watch either of those). and the important thing was not that Nadiya (deservedly) won, but that all three managed to produce gob-smacking works of art in their final task. I was glad to be one of the fourteen million amazed spectators.   

Adapting to change

Salutary viewing last night, watching the nation's Post Offices being dragged into a bright new commercial future, whether they like it or not. There's an army of smart, smooth-talking cookies laying down the law, that you either have to sell tons of merchandise, or move over and let the post office go to SPAR/the local garage/wherever. There's a kind of logic to it, that there's been substantial government subsidy, and a decline in customers, but there's also a political choice, that we'll invest government money in bombing Syria and propping up the banks, but not in maintaining a social service that supports some of the vulnerable old people with whom this country is increasingly going to be concerned. 

And I can't help seeing a parallel with the libraries, similarly threatened with closure and contraction - and for similar reasons; fewer borrowers, more books on kindle etc. That's less publicised, but Shropshire is scurrying around trying to ditch responsibility for running an effective library network across the county, without actually spelling out to library users what is going on. As the cookies keep saying, things are changing round here, and you have to get used to it. Or else.  

Humans

It's only fair.  When, as happens far too often, a TV series promises and then fails to deliver, I moan about it. So here's to Humans (channel 4, sunday nights), the series I never planned to watch. I caught the trailers early on - they were hard to miss - and made my usual rapid decision: robots, sci fi, no, I don't think so. Then, somewhere along the line - someone at Tai Chi maybe -  somebody said "It's better than you think." so I gave it a try, and i'm really glad I did. It's not tech for the sake of it, and the heart of it is a subtle, serious look at family dynamics, well written and acted by all five. The science of the sci fi is incredibly complicated, but it does explore very neatly boundary lines between human and not human, the basis of morality etc etc. I'll be sad to see it go.

It's not going, of course. Like any half decent TV show these days, if it works well then they have to do a second series. But I'd be amazed if it has half the impact. (Broadchurch, anyone?) This, after all, was about exploring a new relationship, of humans to synths. That virgin fertile ground will never be quite the same again, but while it's still fresh, thanks for the memory.   

Dementia

Double helping of dementia, catching up on stuff I've recorded this week. First the film Iris, and then the third episode of the channel 4 documentary Dementiaville, which I think has been brilliant. My wife Linda's been less excited, but she's familiar with the territory, regularly running two Singing for the Brain groups. For me, looking in from the outside, it's been fascinating. OK. It's out there, and it's growing, and most of us are going to meet it sooner or later. It can hit anyone, and as it happens many of the examples here had been fit, intelligent active people, doing all the stuff you're supposed to do to keep you healthy in old age. Then it starts and eats away, at accelerating speed, and although there's caring and clever stuff you can do to reduce the impact, to prolong memories and positive times, this isn't a Hollywood movie where you'll turn it around in the end. It'll get worse, often bitter and sordid, and as one doctor says it's a mercy you don't know what you're in for when you start, because you wouldn't be able to cope. Grim warning, but so much love and thought going into how we might respond. Watch and learn.

TV interviews

How do you find out about serious artists? Easy. You watch someone interview them on TV. not so easy. the art of asking the right questions, of getting people to talk and then actually to listen to what they say, so as to guide further questions, is really difficult. As people get used to it - Wark, Lawson, Yentob - they slip into a self-important ease, an assumption that actually they're on a par with these people, are just as interesting as these people, and maybe they deserve the same amount of time..But then someone gives the amateurs a go, and you realise why the professionals have a job. Cillian Murphy talking to Ken Loach should have been brilliant. Mates, who've done good work together, and clearly have a mutula affection and respect. Deeply embarrasisng. Murphy smiles and stutters, searches for the right words to say, oozes relaxation and obviously, like so many actors, wishes to be loved - but hasn't actually put much thought into which questions he's going to ask. Locah manages to say some interesting things nonetheless, but it's a massive wasted opportunity.

Formula telly (2)

So last night it's The Game, and it's over. Big sigh of relief, really. It was interesting, trying to give us a detailed picture of old style Cold War espionage, when it's been done so thoroughly by Le Carre. This wasn't a patch on that, though they'd clearly spent huge amounts of time and money trying to get the look of it right, striving for the quality of film rather than standard TV. Which is fine, if you've got the script to support it. But this was so full of improbabilities that suspending disbelief was simply impossible. In this tangled denouement, for instance, a dogged secretary spends the night working through cardboard files (no computer in sight) and manages to come up with six deeply hidden soviet spies embedded in British life, hitherto unsuspected by anyone in the department. Wow. she must be smart. Put her in charge straight away. Or, tear up the script  and don't put in the camera and acting work until you've got a story we can believe in.

Formula telly (1)

There's not a lot on the box these days, so I end up watching stuff and then wondering why. Nashville, for instance. I can remember greeting it when it started, with excited amazement that it sustained the trick of Altman's Nashville film, combining politics and country music. Well, the music's still there, and it's great, and maybe that's what keeps me watching. some of the acting is terrific, and there's characters with a bit of depth and interest. But the longer it goes on the harder it is for them to find permutations of the plot which will feed these perpetual cliffhangers - tension, emotional crisis, heartbreaking discovery. So it gets less likely by the minute. There's no normal, no steady accumulation of realistic detail - it's maximum impact, again and again. What else should I expect of a soap?cos that's all it it, even if the magic name of T bone burnett suggests I should be hoping for more.

The offer of a lifetime

For someone who’s written political plays, this was dynamite. In direct, eloquent terms, Nicola Sturgeon offers Ed Miliband the chance to see off the Cameron Conservatives for good. He won’t get enough votes to do it on his own; large numbers of the seats on which he used to rely will be occupied by the SNP, so what about it?

You can see why he has to say no. What’s left of the Labour Party in Scotland needs his support to keep going at all. Sturgeon doesn’t have the support of a majority vote behind her, and the Tories would love to rouse the ire of Little England against a red who’s ganging up with the Scots. But I fear we may yet be haunted by her alternative, that Miliband turns down the chance of working with the SNP, only to see Cameron saunter back into power, keener to do more damage to the unity of the United Kingdom than the SNP ever envisaged.

Read all about it

Because I was out performing last night, I didn’t watch the TV leaders’ debate. I nip into town to do some shopping, and catch the SUN’s headline – photo of Ed Miliband “Oops – I just lost the election.” Really? Was it that bad. then i get home to see The Guardian, which has a poll that reckons Miliband did better than Cameron. Of course. I need to remind myself, that papers aren’t reporting the election, they’re part of it, and the mock-Miliband industry will continue flat out whatever he says or does. I caught up on the on the recorded programme, and watched it a bit at a time – there’s only so much blustering insistence on being heard that you can take. For me, Cameron looked sadly out of place, and I’m sure I’m not the only English voter who wouldn’t mind the chance to vote for Nicola Sturgeon – clear, passionate and smart. What wouldn’t I give to have someone like that running the UK government?

BBC3 rocks

For the second time in a week, I’m impressed by a BBC3 documentary. Last week it was Stacey Dooley on domestic violence, and a clear, thorough job she made of it. Tonight it’s an English Muslim woman, braving the post-charlie atmosphere in France, headscarf and all. she was terrific; sympathetic, intelligent but also spontaneous. There was a lovely moment when she spoke with a fully-veiled teenager who was sure she’d have a better life in Saudi – she nodded, and then moved away, remarking “that’s bonkers.” Even more, sadly, was the extra bonkers response to the killings. a junior school class is asked to respond to the “Are you Charlie?” question. They all know the right answer, except one thoughtful Muslim lad, who dissents. His dad is called in, and asked why his son supports terrorists. Dad, amazingly calm, asks his son what a terrorist is. He doesn’t know. All he knows is, someone’s made fun of Mohammed, so he’s on the opposite side. And yet, after all that, the police still call the lad in to be formally questioned. Bonkers isn’t the word.

Cucumber

It’s so sad that Russell T. Davies series has this image of aggressively explicit male sexuality, which must have savagely reduced its audience. Resisting occasional twinges of distaste, I’ve stayed with it from the start , and loved it, partly because he’s always capable of just taking your breath away. In tonight’s episode, there’s a scene where Lance, tempted to go back with his new but dangerous boyfriend, thinks about just going home to bed. This strange wise woman – who turns out to be a dead, and therefore maybe an angel – gently questions whether he needs this extra pressure and excitement (which, it turns out, will be the cause of his death). Imaginative, sensitive, stunning – light years away from the jokey crude trailers which have so crudely established the identity of this series in the minds of potential viewers.