Author Archives: admin

Agatha And The Art Of Murder. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Ruth Bradley, Ralph Ineson, Tim McInnerny, Blake Harrison, Pippa Haywood, Michael McElhatton, Bebe Cave, Brian McCardie, Dean Andrews, Samantha Spiro, Stacha Hicks, Liam McMahon, Joshua Silver, Luke Pierre, Seamus O’ Hare, Clare McMahon, Amelia Dell, Derek Halligan, Richard Doubleday.

Nobody truly disappears without a reason, whether it is in the spirit of foul play, a release from the pressure of life, or in the act of rage fuelled revenge, people don’t vanish from public life unless there is a motive lurking under the soil of the person’s existence in which leads to the art of murder being employed.

Agatha And The Art Of Murder. Television Review. full post

(630 words, estimated 2:31 mins reading time)

Watership Down (2018). Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * *

Cast: James McAvoy, Nicholas Hoult, John Boyega, Ben Kingsley, Gemma Arterton, Peter Capaldi, Mackenzie Crook, Anne-Marie Duff, Taron Egerton, Freddie Fox, Lee Ingleby, Miles Jupp, Daniel Kaluuya, Craig Parkinson, Daniel Rigby, Jason Watkins, Gemma Chan, James Alexander, Rosamund Pike, Andrew Walton, Olivia Colman, Lorraine Bruce, Rosie Day, Henry Goodman, Murray McArthur, Tom Wilkinson, James Faulkner, Lizzie Clarke, Rory Kinnear, Charlotte Spencer, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, Peter Guinness, Sam Redford, Luke Neal.

Watership Down (2018). Television Review. full post

(509 words, estimated 2:02 mins reading time)

Upstart Crow: A Crow Christmas Carol. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: David Mitchell, Kenneth Branagh, Liza Tarbuck, Tim Downie, Harry Enfield, Gemma Whelen, Lily Cole, Dominic Coleman, Jocelyn Jee Esien, Mark Heap, Rob Rouse, Steven Speirs, Spencer Jones, Helen Monks, Paula Wilcox, Rosanna Beacock, Hannah-Jane Fox, Karl Theobald, Luka Petrovic.

Words, songs, and inspiration hang in ether waiting for the right ear in which to discern their meaning, what though a clever mind can deduce is sometimes another soul will mark them with greater solemnity, the time is not always right – and the words are heeded, but allowed with great wishes and understanding to find another home in which to be born, another time in which the need is nobler, the suffering of the people more acute.

Upstart Crow: A Crow Christmas Carol. Television Review. full post

(504 words, estimated 2:01 mins reading time)

Take Me To Hope Street. Radio Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Annabelle Dowler, Shaun Mason, Laura Dos Santos, Ian Conningham, Monty d’Iverno, Jane Slavin, Lile Marie Gibney.

There are many ways in which to celebrate or commemorate Christmas, chiefly amongst them is the act of memory, of remembering all those who have come into your life over the years but who, for whatever reason, have slowly disappeared from it, an act of forgiveness perhaps required on your part for the wrong they may have caused you, a meaningful gesture from the depths of your soul as you seek to be pardoned from the inappropriate action you may have caused distress with. It is though the act of forgiving yourself in which the time of year holds its greatest fear, a dread in which few are willing to face, and in which the Christmas ghost story deals with in spine-tingling relish.

Take Me To Hope Street. Radio Drama Review. full post

(489 words, estimated 1:57 mins reading time)

Looking For Oil Drum Lane. Radio Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: Marc Wootton, Barry Castagnola, James Hurn, Phil Cornwell, Ian Pearce, Toby Longworth.

It has been observed that the closest occupation resembling death, is that of writing. The endless search for inspiration is consuming, an overwhelming, often fearful, unbearable shadow in which the writer sees only blankness before them. It is a struggle that requires discipline, the ability to keep going in a desert of solo thought, and fortune to come up with an idea that, if you are lucky, will grip the nation in tears, or with hope in laughter.

Looking For Oil Drum Lane. Radio Drama Review. full post

(568 words, estimated 2:16 mins reading time)

The Haunting Of M.R. James. Radio Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Mark Gatiss, Fenella Woolgar, Ryan Whittle, Gerald McDermott, Cameron Percival, Ronny Jhutti, Michael Bertenshaw, Tony Turner, Ewan Bailey, Chris Harper, Sam Dale, Lewis Bray.

We live in a world that is rapidly losing its sense of wonder, of having everything explained and leaving the thought of fancy and intrigue hanging in the air as if somehow resembling the figure of dishonest fruit hiding knowledge from the feast of humanity.

The Haunting Of M.R. James. Radio Drama Review. full post

(547 words, estimated 2:11 mins reading time)

Born To Be Wilde: An Ideal Husband. Radio Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: John Heffernan, Miranda Raison, Ryan Whittle, Lucy Doyle, Saffron Coomber, Michael Bertenshaw, Elizabeth Counsell, Tony Turner, Sean Murray.

If you can change the appearance of William Shakespeare’s work by adding a certain modern charm to the story, then any writer from literature’s illustrious past is worthy of eliciting a certain degree of similar occasion from; many will be called to the performance circle, many works will be deemed unfavourably, some unconsciously denied the modern touch and added personal extras, and some will shine like a beacon of joy, asking only companionship for a while of the supporter.

Born To Be Wilde: An Ideal Husband. Radio Drama Review. full post

(460 words, estimated 1:50 mins reading time)

Shred Kelly, Archipelago. Album Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

No person is truly an island, perhaps not even a peninsula, cut partially adrift but somehow staring out to the far horizon as if with noble intentions, only a tenuous link keeping it from becoming a solitary mass and suffering from its own identity and practises. We like to think of ourselves as unified, a combined thought acting in many ways together, and when the fight is against us, we somehow pull together, weathering the storm as one.

Shred Kelly, Archipelago. Album Review. full post

(399 words, estimated 1:36 mins reading time)

Still Open All Hours, (Christmas 2018). Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Cast: David Jason, James Baxter, Stephanie Cole, Brigit Forsyth, Maggie Ollerenshaw, Kulvindar Ghir, Sally Lindsay, Johnny Vegas, Tim Healy, Katie Radford, Rita Tushingham, Roger Sloman, Geoffrey Whitehead, Sophie Willan.

At any time of year it is important to remember to shop local, the CEOs of large corporations don’t need that extra few bucks in which to keep to themselves, so called high flyers who profit off the debt in which we have become accustomed too, can by the collective will of the people, find themselves a little poorer, a little less sanctimonious, a might less smug.

Still Open All Hours, (Christmas 2018). Television Review. full post

(471 words, estimated 1:53 mins reading time)

Liverpool Sound And Vision: An Interview With White Little Lies, (Vanessa Murray And Daniel Saleh).

Life and Time are intrinsically linked, yet we are often caught out by both in different ways. We often see life as a progression of choices, that it is our own will which causes the present to be what it is, our lives shaped by determination, and yet Time’s hand is often overlooked, the quip of fate perhaps forgotten in the so called age of reason, and above all the chance encounter of a lyric shared becoming a link in which the forging of all is recognised only after Time has elapsed and lost in the fog of recognition.

Liverpool Sound And Vision: An Interview With White Little Lies, (Vanessa Murray And Daniel Saleh). full post

(2445 words, estimated 9:47 mins reading time)