Arts Reviews

Uberto Pasolini’s The Return stars Ralph Fiennes and Juliette Binoche in a retelling of the last section of Homer’s Odyssey. He is Odysseus and she is Penelope in a stripped-back tale that presents the pair as psychologically plausible human beings rather than characters from Greek myth. Fiennes and Binoche are, of course, spellbinding. I could look at their faces all day. But the narrative is so parched and meditative it’s ultimately enervating and seems as depressed as the hero himself. I ended up longing for a Cyclops or at least a six-headed monster. Written by John Collee, Edward Bond and also Pasolini, the film throws no Gods or monsters in

Tribe with Bruce Parry ran for three fondly remembered series in the mid-2000s. Now, upgraded to Tribe with Bruce Parry, it’s back, still championing traditional ways of life – including that of a TV presenter who lives among remote peoples, takes loads of drugs with them and marvels at their closeness to nature. Sunday’s episode featured some other age-old practices, too. Parry, for example, duly travelled up an Amazon tributary to a village where the locals were initially suspicious of ‘the white man’. He then won them over by mucking in with the chores and eating plenty of insects and grubs. His companions this time were the Waimaha, who live

Mr Burton is a biopic of Richard Burton’s early years and an origins story, if you like. It stars Harry Lawtey as young Richard and Toby Jones as Philip Burton, the inspirational teacher whose name he would take. It’s a fascinating story. In essence, Richard’s drunkard father sold him for £50. But the film is too devoted and sedate to fly as a cinematic event. It has the feel of a Sunday evening television drama. Nothing wrong with that – although you could just stay home on a Sunday evening and watch television if that’s what you’re after. Cheaper, and much less bother. There’s too little Manville here for my

The Starland Vocal Band were on to something. In their 1976 hit ‘Afternoon Delight’ they sang, in gruesomely twee harmony: ‘Gonna grab some afternoon delight/ My motto’s always been when it’s right it’s right/ Why wait until the middle of a cold, dark night?’ Granted, they were singing about rumpy-pumpy, not theatre-going, but for many of us the same principle applies.  ‘I’ve turned into the kind of person who loves toddling off to matinees,’ admitted my actor friend Timmy recently. He’s not the only one. I’m at that age when lunch is preferable to dinner and matinees appeal far more than evening shows. There’s something hedonistic about a matinee. When