Film review: Concerning Violence November 28, 2014 Cert 15 | ★★★★☆ The first revelation in Concerning Violence is that Lauryn Hill’s been doing more with her days than massacring her back catalogue and signing up to tax evasion schemes. She provides the soulful voiceover for this documentary about the end of colonial rule in Africa, drawing on text from pioneering anti-colonial [...]
Photography review: Guy Bourdin: Image-Maker November 28, 2014 Somerset House | ★★★★☆ Guy Bourdin: Image-Maker at Somerset House begins with a largely unpublished series of surreal fashion images charting a road trip from London to Brighton with a car-load of Charles Jourdan shoes and a pair of mannequin legs. The legs strut across the frames, both a presence and an absence, suggesting [...]
Photography review: Conflict, the Photography November 28, 2014 Tate Modern | ★★★★★ In Tate Modern’s sprawling new exhibition marking a hundred years since the beginning of the First World War, conflict, time and photography add up to a moving meditation on the nature of remembrance. Curator Simon Barker smartly decides to arrange exhibits according to proximity to the conflict, rather than chronologically. [...]
Art review: Post-Pop: East Meets West November 28, 2014 Saatchi Gallery | ★★★★☆ “Have you sold your soul, have you sold your soul, have you sold your soul?” It’s hard to imagine the current crop of Turner Prize nominees making a statement as baldly political as this. While the art of the moment seeks refuge in the obscure, the artists in the Saatchi [...]
Film review: Paddington is sweet as marmalade November 27, 2014 Cert PG | ★★★★☆ Paddington Bear is back and he’s looking… scary. With mangey, greying fur and little sharp teeth, it’s easier to imagine him ripping the throats out of livestock in Alaska than nibbling marmalade sandwiches in west London. Appearances, though, can be deceiving. In spirit, Paddington Bear is cuddlier than [...]
Something for the weekend November 27, 2014 AMERICAN TREATS: THANKSGIVING AT THE MAZE GRILL With Josper-grilled turkey, honey roast parsnips and delicately spiced pumpkin soup, Gordon Ramsay is beating the yanks at their own game with the Thanksgiving menu at his Maze Grill restaurant. Three courses £35; gordonramsay.com/mazegrill ROMANTIC FUN: SOMERSET HOUSE ICE SKATING Christmas wouldn’t be christmas without skating at Somerset [...]
Tony Bevan at Ben Brown Fine Arts: The tree of life, death and the mind November 23, 2014 Painter Tony Bevan speaks ahead of his show at Ben Brown Fine Arts. Tony Bevan established a name for himself with blood-coloured self-portraits that snarled and gurned and twisted into the white of the canvas. Meeting him today, you’d be forgiven for asking, where are the devilish flared nostrils, the vast egg cranium [...]
Photography review: World Press Photo 2014 November 21, 2014 Royal Festival Hall | ★★★★☆ The World Press Photograph of the Year has been running since 1955, with the numbers of entries increasing steadily. For this year’s competition a record-breaking 5,754 photographers from 132 countries submitted 98,671 pictures, with subjects ranging from the Boston Marathon bombing to the collapse of the Rana Plaza in [...]
Theatre review: Behind the Beautiful Forevers November 21, 2014 Olivier Theatre | ★★★☆☆ The dirtiest thing in the Annawadi slum is the language. Above the din of arriving and departing planes (Annawadi is located right next to Mumbai airport) millions of slum-dwellers bicker, joke and philosophise in words as colourful as the advertising hoardings above their heads. American author Katherine Boo depicted [...]
Film review: Get On Up November 21, 2014 Cert 12a | ★★★☆☆ Many films don’t feature a single scene in which two female characters talk about something other than a man. I’m not sure this film features a single scene in which any two characters talk about something other than James Brown. Like many biopics, Get On Up subscribes to [...]