The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE recommends an impressive impersonation of Bob Dylan
Fancy a TV binge?
Among upcoming TV series available globally, DENNIS BROE picks out the good, the bad and the interesting
The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews Here, Vermiglio, William Tell and Wolf Man
New releases from Thorpe and Morrison, Daria Kulesh, and Will Finn and Rosie Calvert
RINA ARYA confronts the brutal operation of Francis Bacon’s approach to portraiture
Emphasising his continuous engagement in labour movement struggles, ALISTAIR FINDLAY salutes John Foster’s contribution as activist, strategist, intellectual and defender of the Morning Star
ANDY MIAH advocates the use of AI to assist people by expanding access to global literature and culture
EWAN KOTZ relishes a veteran Glasgow band that have lost none of their verve for live performance
The Good:
Machine (ARTE/Amazon Prime)
This series, written by Thomas Bidegain (A Prophet), currently available to be streamed for free on the Arte website, crosses the always vibrant French social realist tradition with kung fu sequences.
A young woman, escaped most likely from the French military, hiding out in a small town and counselled by a Marxist worker of colour, combats factory goons intent on breaking a strike in support of keeping the factory in France instead of the buyer’s intention of moving it to Poland to save money.
The male-female camaraderie and the concealed power of the female combatant echoes the Gina Davis/Samuel L Jackson film The Long Kiss Goodnight and makes for a compelling ride.
More from this author
A landmark work of gay ethnography, an avant-garde fusion of folk and modernity, and a chance comment in a great interview
ANGUS REID applauds the inventive stagecraft with which the Lyceum serve up Stevenson’s classic, but misses the deeper themes
ANGUS REID time-travels back to times when Gay Liberation was radical and allied seamlessly to an anti-racist, anti-establishment movement
ANGUS REID speaks to historian Siphokazi Magadla about the women who fought apartheid and their impact on South African society
Similar stories
Hallucinogenic homosexuality, a quantum thriller, airport shenanigans and feminist Tolkein: MARIA DUARTE reviews Queer, The Universal Theory, Carry On and Lord of the Rings: The War of The Rohirrim
DENNIS BROE picks his highlights
The Star's critic MARIA DUARTE reviews The Fall Guy, Red Herring, Love Lies Bleeding and The Idea of You
New releases by Ma Polaine’s Great Decline, Phoebe Rees and Lucien Johnson