Recommended Television Programmes

[Serial_Apologist]

Do report back on Baron Noir!

Baron's Court

or

Barons Court?

[Nick Armstrong]

Baron's Court

or

Barons Court?

Well he hasn’t been caught yet but I’m only halfway through the season

[Bryn]

Baron's Court

or

Barons Court?

London Above, or London Below?

[Nick Armstrong]

Thanks, we can "borrow" our daughter's subscription, and enjoyed Borgen etc so will look it out.

Plus: surprise introduction of an 1806 Érard forte piano into the plot of Baron Noir towards the end of season 1

[LMcD]

Jimmy McGovern's 'Anthony', now on iPlayer. I can't do better than quote the conclusion of the review in today's Times:
'Heart-breaking, thought-provoking, and never a misery-fest. Don't miss this one'.

[Dave2002]

The Long Song, based on Andreas Levy's book, was gripping in three episodes. Very well done. Still available on iPlayer.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/b0bw99xk/the-long-song

[Dave2002]

The Long Song, based on Andreas Levy's book, was gripping in three episodes. Very well done. Still available on iPlayer.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episod.../the-long-song

After watching this, I wondered if many of the people who came on the Windrush - itself a subject of a scandal in the UK over recent years - were actually descendents of slaves, and thus perhaps victims (indirectly) of racist "crimes" [**] in earlier centuries. Looking into the issues re Windrush, it seems that a significant number of people came from Jamaica, though some from other countries, such as Trinidad and Tobago. Some Jamaicans are likely to have British slaves as ancestors. Other countries were involved in previous centuries - Spain, France, Netherlands.

[**] of course the "crimes" were institutionalised, and the law was biased against the slaves for a long while, and even perhaps after they were liberated. So legally it was often the slaves who were committing the crimes, and sentenced, and sometimes executed, yet the landowners and the British and later governments which supported them were "wronged" and compensated.

By modern standards of ethics this seems very wrong indeed, but we can't rewrite all of the history now.

[Cockney Sparrow]

By modern standards of ethics this seems very wrong indeed, but we can't rewrite all of the history now.

Agree with you there.... How far do we go back? I think we should concentrate on the present and future, or perhaps since the inception of T May's "hostile environment". Informed by the past.

Yes - we are watching this series, very good production.

[Dave2002]

Oddly I only knew one person from the West Indies, quite a long while ago. Probably impolite to try to find her and ask about these issues, though it would be good to have views from people from the Caribbean islands. Her name was Julie.

[oddoneout]

Agree with you there.... How far do we go back? I think we should concentrate on the present and future, or perhaps since the inception of T May's "hostile environment". Informed by the past.

Yes - we are watching this series, very good production.

A few weeks back there was one of David Olusoga's excellent documentaries which tracked the inception of the 'hostile environment'. It has its roots in the government and its advisors reaction to the influx of coloured people into the UK, particularly in the light of the Windrush episode. Having invited people to Britain there was concern at the numbers who took up the offer. In other words those in charge(in various capacities) at the time, manufactured or deliberately increased a climate of mistrust among the British people, in an effort to discourage immigration. The ripples meant that places which had been historically rubbing along OK with earlier immigrants got caught up in it and unsettled.
T May simply built on that despicable foundation.

[LMcD]

BBC 4 tonight at 7.30 p.m: a Prom concert from 2002 in which Simon Rattle conducts the NYO and massed choirs in Mahler's 8th symphony.

[Serial_Apologist]

The return of Unreported World to Channel 4, each Friday at 7.30pm following immediately on from the news, is a most welcome breath of fresh air, as was well exemplified by tonight's episode, dealing with Trump's female support base among the Southern Bible Belt. Non-sequitur quote of the night was probably this, "God created man and woman in His image", although a black preacher saying had it not been for the white man - the white MAN, one of his audience stressed - there would be no America, came a close second. In one sense true, but in another the programme was a sad exposure on the debasement of mainstream thinking among a sizeable white demographic in the States that these sad people, in deep denial, represented the most coherent defense for the status quo following the consequences 40 years' imposition of Neo-liberal socioeconomics on the heart of the Free World. At least in the early days the right posed arguments worth engaging with.

[Rjw]

I don't really watch tv anymore, too dumbed down, but I am enjoying listening to Bayern playing nicely gegen Barcelona.

[gurnemanz]

[QUOTE=Rjw;804770]I don't really watch tv anymore, too dumbed down QUOTE]

Not my experience at all. Lots of worthwhile programmes available from a multiplicity of sources and in great technical quality.

[LMcD]

[QUOTE=gurnemanz;804772]

I don't really watch tv anymore, too dumbed down QUOTE]

Not my experience at all. Lots of worthwhile programmes available from a multiplicity of sources and in great technical quality.

There are literally hundreds of programmes and series available on iPlayer - 147 beginning with 'A' alone - and not all of them are turkeys. And BBC2 and BBC4 have scheduled some worthwhile repeats including, for example, 'Tess Of The D'Urbervilles', 'A House Through Time' (both series) and 'A Wild Year'.