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TV
If you only watch one, make it …
The Bear
Disney+; full series available now
Summed up in a sentence The Bear isn’t the chaotic “Yes, chef!” drama it used to be – but that’s no bad thing, as it is beautiful to watch this urban family grow.
What our reviewer said “Payoffs big and small ping in every scene as narrative seeds carefully sown – including in that bad third season! – burst into bloom and these people we have come to adore are rewarded.” Jack Seale
Further reading ‘Shh, chef!’ The agonising, joyful power of silent TV episodes
Pick of the rest
Squid Game
Netflix; full series available now
Summed up in a sentence The Korean dystopian thriller is now much less pointed than its first stellar series, and it has become ludicrous even by its own standards – but fans simply must know how it all ends!
What our reviewer said “If you can get on board with the new contestant twist – and that is a big if – then the final two episodes have a nicely grand and operatic feel to them, and ultimately, Squid Game does its job. But it leaves the impression, too, that it has become a more traditional action-thriller than it once was.” Rebecca Nicholson
Further reading ‘People like happy endings. Sorry!’ Squid Game’s brutal finale ramps up the barbarity
Amol Rajan Goes to the Ganges
BBC One/iPlayer; available now
Summed up in a sentence As he grieves his beloved father, the atheist broadcaster sets off on a pilgrimage that takes him on a surprisingly glorious spiritual adventure.
What our reviewer said “What Amol Rajan Goes to the Ganges expresses most powerfully of all, certainly to this fellow bereaved Hindu, are the irresolvable particularities, and commonalities, of second-generation grief.” Chitra Ramaswamy
You may have missed …
The Change
Channel 4; both series available now
Summed up in a sentence The second series of Bridget Christie’s whimsical and wonderful menopause story is life-affirming – with cracking comedy moments.
What our reviewer said “The Change is ambitious, surreal, moving, and above all hysterically funny. It is unlike anything else on TV.” Chitra Ramaswamy
Further reading Bridget Christie on brain fog, flirting, and why she won’t be taking a lover: ‘My heart is full. I am open to it, but I’m not looking for it’
Film
If you only watch one, make it …
F1 the Movie
In cinemas now
Summed up in a sentence Brad Pitt stars as a supercool old-school driver returning 30 years after a near fatal crash to break all the rules of Formula One racing.
What our reviewer said “Motor racing is a sport in which constituent team members seem to be competing against each other as much as against the opposition, and so it ought to be an ideal subject for a movie treatment. There’s a fair bit of macho silliness here, but the panache with which director Joseph Kosinski puts it together is very entertaining.” Peter Bradshaw
Further reading Brad Pitt in the paddock: how F1 the Movie went deep to keep fans coming
Pick of the rest
From Hilde, With Love
In cinemas now
Summed up in a sentence Heart-wrenching true story about anti-Nazi activist Hilde Coppi, a dental assistant who is arrested while pregnant
What our reviewer said “Hilde’s story, told here by interspersing scenes of her grim prison life and the first summer of her love affair with Hans, is comparable to that of iconic anti-Hitler activist Sophie Scholl, but this is a more adult, passionate drama.” Peter Bradshaw
Sudan, Remember Us
In cinemas now
Summed up in a sentence Documentary that draws on director Hind Meddeb’s on-the-spot experience in 2019 as protesters rose against the 30-year rule of Omar al-Bashir.
What our reviewer said “Meddeb finds among the protesters a vivid, vibrant artistic movement: an oral culture of music, poetry and rap which flourishes on the streets. There is also a kind of subversive, surrealist energy: the camera finds a mock traffic roadworks sign reading: ‘Sorry for the Delay – Uprooting a Regime’.” Peter Bradshaw
Clueless
In cinemas now
Summed up in a sentence Thirtieth anniversary rerelease of Amy Heckerling’s high-school romcom coming-of-age classic starring Alicia Silverstone and Brittany Murphy, composed entirely of quotable funny lines, remains a sophisticated pleasure.
What our reviewer said “Silverstone is amazingly innocent and charming and her sublimely weightless screen presence has a kind of serenity and maturity that belongs to an instinctive comedy performer.” Peter Bradshaw
Further reading Alicia Silverstone to reprise Clueless role in TV sequel
Now streaming
Final Destination: Bloodlines
Prime Video; out now
Summed up in a sentence Gory horror franchise returns with a hugely entertaining sixth instalment which sets up an entire family tree for the slaughter.
What our reviewer said “The most entertaining kills, which this time around involve everything from lawn tools to an MRI, have a Buster Keaton-esque flair for physical comedy. These sequences, along with the plot as a whole, tend to include little callbacks to the past: buses, barbecues, ceiling fans and logs make cameo appearances, thrilling little reminders of the havoc they can wreak in a Final Destination.” Radheyan Simonpillai
Books
If you only read one, make it …
Endling by Maria Reva
Reviewed by Marcel Theroux
Summed up in a sentence A black comedy about endangered snails and Ukraine’s marriage industry is disrupted, in both narrative and form, by Russia’s full-scale invasion.
What our reviewer said “Rather than feeling distracting or tricksy, the author’s intervention heightens the impact of the story, giving it a discomfiting intensity and a new, more intimate register. We all have skin in the game at this point.”
Pick of the rest
The Original by Nell Stevens
Reviewed by Lara Feigel
Summed up in a sentence A flamboyant tale of fakery and forgers that delights in queering the Victorian era.
What our reviewer said “In book after book, Stevens is showing herself to be that rare thing: a writer who we can think alongside, even while she’s making things up.”
Among Friends by Hal Ebbott
Reviewed by Christopher Shrimpton
Summed up in a sentence The perfect lives of wealthy New Yorkers are shattered by a violent act on a birthday weekend.
What our reviewer said “A bracingly honest and affectingly intimate depiction of abuse, family dynamics and self-deceit … it upends its characters’ lives so ruthlessly and revealingly that it is hard not to take pleasure in a false facade being finally smashed.”
Witness in a Time of Turmoil by Ian Mayes
Reviewed by Joe Moran
Summed up in a sentence Behind the scenes at the Guardian, 1986-1995.
What our reviewer said “Few events in these years, from the fatwa on Rushdie to the first Gulf war, failed to provoke fierce disagreements in the newsroom.”
Beastly Britain by Karen R Jones
Reviewed by Kathryn Hughes
Summed up in a sentence How animals have shaped British identity.
What our reviewer said “Hedgehogs were reputed to sneak into human settlements at night and steal eggs (true) and suck the udders of sleeping cows (almost certainly false).”
You may have missed …
The Evin Prison Bakers’ Club by Sepideh Gholian
Reviewed by Alex Clark
Summed up in a sentence Life on the women’s wards of Iran’s infamous prison.
What our reviewer said “It is unclear how many of these dishes are materially realised within the confines of the prison, and how many are acts of fantasy, a dream of what life might be like in the future.”
Music
If you only listen to one, make it …
Lorde: Virgin
Out now
Summed up in a sentence After her 2021 album Solar Power embraced switching off, the New Zealand musician returns to pop’s fray to revel in chaos and carnality.
What our reviewer said “Virgin is haunted by a very late-20s kind of angst, born of the sense that you’re now incontrovertibly an adult, regardless of whether you feel like one – and despite the euphoric choruses, the sound of Virgin is noticeably unsettled and rough.” Alexis Petridis
Further reading Girl, so inspiring! Lorde’s 20 best songs – ranked
Pick of the rest
NZO: Come Alive
Out now
Summed up in a sentence The mysterious new Sheffield-based artist’s thrillingly complete sound world is glitchily complex but beguilingly light on its feet.
What our reviewer said “You can find affinities with other artists and styles here: the bookish but playful minimalism of another Sheffield musician, Mark Fell; Objekt’s trickster vision for bass music and techno; the white-tiled cleanliness of some of Sophie’s work; Jlin’s paradoxically static funk. But the way it’s all pulled together is totally NZO’s.” Ben Beaumont-Thomas
BC Camplight: A Sober Conversation
Out now
Summed up in a sentence The US singer’s seventh album takes his meta-theatrical style almost into showtune territory as he confronts being abused by a camp counsellor as a child.
What our reviewer said “Christinzio’s inventive, infuriating writing often packs three extra songs into every single track – but this time for good reason. When the chatter falls away on instrumental closer Leaving Camp Four Oaks, he achieves a hard-won, sun-lit sense of peace.” Katie Hawthorne
Joshua Redman: Words Fall Short
Out now
Summed up in a sentence The US saxophonist pulls back the vocals of his last record to present a new ensemble and all-original repertoire, resulting in an ideal balance of ingenuity and rapport.
What our reviewer said “He has introduced a terrific new young road band on an all-original repertoire … the result is an album that feels more like an ideal balance of Redman’s own ingenuity and his ensemble rapport.” John Fordham
Lana Del Rey
On tour this week
Summed up in a sentence The US singer-songwriter debuts some songs from her long-awaited new album The Right Person Will Stay on her first stadium tour.
What our reviewer said “Lana Del Rey is crying real tears next to plastic weeping willows, momentarily overcome by the size of the audience. This sort of tension, the push-pull between genuine vulnerability and an exploration of aesthetics, has always been there in her music, and her wonderfully ambitious first stadium tour runs on it.” Huw Baines
