talkmagic.co.uk

Now, this is creepy. I'm writing a feature about online appreciation societies. This afternoon, I've been working through an interview with someone from Six of One. The TV's on with the sound turned down. I just glanced at it and The Prisoner has just started! It's The Chimes of Big Ben unless I'm very much mistaken.

Did you know that the uncredited fruity female voice that makes the announcements in The Village is hatstand Carry On Screaming actress Fenella Fielding?

Tomo wrote:Did you know that the uncredited fruity female voice that makes the announcements in The Village is hatstand Carry On Screaming actress Fenella Fielding?

Yup, and at one time she was actually known as Fruity Fenella if I remember right!

Oh poo. They've shelved plans to make a big screen remake of The Prisoner. The series is still happening, though.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/movies/a172 ... e.html?rss

Speaking of quality telly. Tonight, 7:30pm, BBC4. The BIG one. Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. Bliss beyond measure!

Bang Goes the Theory

Monday 28 September
7:30pm - 8:00pm
BBC1

Science series. Jem Stansfield puts spider silk - the strongest material in the natural world - to the test; Liz Bonnin joins the RAF's flight school to find out the truth about multi-tasking; Dr Yan Wong experiments with sodium acetate; and Dallas Campbell dusts off his top hat to reveal the secret science of magic.

Spiders and magic: does telly get any better than this?

Bang Goes the Theory

Monday 28 September
7:30pm - 8:00pm
BBC1

Science series. Jem Stansfield puts spider silk - the strongest material in the natural world - to the test; Liz Bonnin joins the RAF's flight school to find out the truth about multi-tasking; Dr Yan Wong experiments with sodium acetate; and Dallas Campbell dusts off his top hat to reveal the secret science of magic.

Spiders and magic: does telly get any better than this?

Film: Seance on a Wet Afternoon

Tuesday 29 September
1:15pm - 3:25pm
Channel 4

Kim Stanley gives a compelling Oscar-nominated performance as an unbalanced medium in writer/director Bryan Forbes's engrossing and imaginative drama. She orders her browbeaten husband (Richard Attenborough) to kidnap a wealthy industrialist's daughter so she can enhance her reputation as a spiritualist by "finding" the youngster. The tension screws are chillingly turned when Attenborough realises his wife will go to any lengths to achieve celebrity status. Using a purposely sombre atmosphere, Forbes skilfully conjures up suspenseful uncertainty as the ghastly implications of Stanley's plan unfold.

I have the afternoon off (cancelled gig - no travelling for me) and am loving watching this gem again!

Going back to the original topic,

Elsewhere Klangster1971 wrote:I want the six hours of my life back that I just wasted watching the US remake of "The Prisoner"

The Reviews in the US were certainly mixed, some loved it, some hated it. I haven't seen any news of when the official UK broadcast will be but sing out if ya hear!

Hmmmm...

I've just watched the first two episodes of The Prisoner remake. Very dark, cryptic and creepy. Lots to find. It bears so little resemblance to the original that it probably qualifies as an original work. Only the premise remains. But much like the original, its subtlety is misleading, which is probably why the critics didn't like it. I mean, how do you review something that needs seeing?

I really didn't like the remake at all...

I like Jim Caviezel and, of course, Ian MacKellen is always good value but the show just lacked any of the charm of the original. And I absolutely hated what they did with their 'explanation' of The Village!!!


Sean

Klangster1971 wrote:I really didn't like the remake at all...

I like Jim Caviezel and, of course, Ian MacKellen is always good value but the show just lacked any of the charm of the original. And I absolutely hated what they did with their 'explanation' of The Village!!!


Sean

I do agree with you about the lack of charm. Then again, we live in a radically cynical time. I've just watched Number 2 walk up to a man tied to a post as if waiting for a firing squad, force this man's mouth open using a live hand grenade, pull the pin and walk off.

TV listings mags show the remake of The Prisoner as due for screening in the UK some time in the week commencing 19th April and it's referred to as a six part series. Now we can all see what's what!

I've just seen an advert for it. Compared to the meat of the series, the trailer looks almost sweet!

Speaking of quality telly:


The Story of Science

Tuesday 27 April
9:00pm - 10:00pm
BBC2

1/6

In the wake of How Earth Made Us and Seven Wonders of the Solar System comes another mind-expanding series from BBC2. For anyone concerned about the quality of TV science recently, it's looking like a bumper year. The presenter here is renaissance man Michael Mosley (former banker, doctor and TV exec). Mosley's style combines ruffled charm, unfussy eloquence and the nagging sense that he knows what he is talking about. Without gimmicks or straining for effect, he carefully explores the way politics and human foibles have changed the evolution of science. He's good on the foibles - how astronomer Tycho Brahe kept a clairvoyant dwarf under his table and had a pet elk that fell down the stairs when drunk, or how Galileo assembled a telescope using artillery balls and an organ pipe. But he's good on the hard facts, too: running through the programme there's a passionate appeal for the primacy of evidence. Tonight's theme is how the idea of a Sun-centred cosmos took hold and changed everything. And yes, there's a scene under Newton's apple tree.

A clairvoyant dwarf and a drunken elk?

Speaking of which, when Prof Brian Cox's "Wonders of the Solar System" was on a few weeks ago, he tweeted that he'd been getting threats from Christians accusing him of "spreading atheist propaganda". I wonder what Michael Mosley will receive?