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Minder: Looking for Micky (1982)
Ooh! Aah! Daily Star!
There is a lot of enjoyable detail in this episode. It's a cameo of a time and place: London in the 1980's. The society and economy of Britain under the government of Prime Minister Thatcher. When prosperity was no longer to be gained through honest toil in traditional industries but rather in the media, celebrity culture and being an entrepreneur.
It's in this context that our lovable rogue Arthur Daley operates. Here he interacts with the British press, when it was still based in Fleet Street. In particular, he tries to take advantage of a new, brash, popular, national newspaper, the Daily Star. It did, and does still, exist. The front page story about an escaped prisoner was just the sort of thing that the paper favoured.
There is also gentle mockery of Britain's serious, high-minded, liberal newspaper, The Guardian. A rare sighting of another famous London newspaper, the Evening Standard, during that brief period when it was titled the New Standard. And finally, one fictional paper called the "Echo".
Reference is made to Ronald Biggs, a notorious, British train robber from the 1960's who became a criminal celebrity, being fêted by, among others, the Sex Pistols.
Dabbling in this dubious but popular world, Arthur comes into contact with some seriously nasty criminals. He's way out his depth and at first doesn't realise the danger he's in.
One of the other dubious characters is a rather sleazy newspaper man named Oates. He is played by Bill Nighy, here in his thirties, but who later went onto be one of Britain's best-loved actors, famed for his portrayal of characters on the big and small screens and indeed on the radio as well. Most of them, in fact, seemed like a development of the character he played here. He really just went from being a young roué to an old roué. He's only just retired, after his most acclaimed final major rôle (contrasting with his usual ones), in "Living" (2022).
There's a sweet cameo by Vanda Godsell, playing gangster's mum, Queenie, looking no older than when she played the saucy, middle-aged barmaid with a heart of gold in the much overlooked 1960 film "Hell Is A City" which showed the dangerous criminal underworld of Manchester.
Dennis Waterman's character, Terry, has never been more sympathetic than in this episode, when he squares up recklessly to the ruthless villains.
There's still plenty of humour, even if it's rather dark, and a running gag about some jackets that Arthur is trying to flog. I don't think I've ever found an episode of Minder more satisfying.
Conjuring Kesha: A Terrifying True (2022)
Terrifying trite
Series about hauntings tend to copy each other, not least by visiting the same places. Maybe it's laziness. Perhaps the owners of the properties in question find the publicity and income useful and are good at marketing themselves.
Westerfeld House had previously been visited by Zak Bagan's crew in Ghost Adventures, season 17, episode 7. It's an interesting place and it was worth a second visit but I'm not sure if this was the right team to do it.
"Team" is an exaggeration as it really is just Kesha and a sidekick, whose purpose, apart from overreacting, isn't really clear. She's a commanding presence all right, like Zak ( but different!) and the camera likes to linger on her, when it isn't chasing around.
Overall, there is too much of the latter and not enough time to absorb the building and its atmosphere. Also missing is any sense of expertise in what they are doing. Admittedly she did well to get the current owner of the property to contribute. What could have been interesting, however, wasn't explored in enough detail, such as the links to Houdini and the Satanists among the associates of Anton Szandor LaVey. Furthermore, the supposed link to Marconi was completely unsubstantiated and I defy anyone to find corroboration anywhere.
On the evidence of this, I will not bother watching any other episodes. Disappointing.
Lewis: The Gift of Promise (2011)
Only the coffee is innocent (maybe!)
This episode is so well researched, historically, and still so currently controversial that if you even try and elucidate any of the parallels with actual events, such as the mysterious code name that recurs, the post will be taken down. I know because I've tried. Someone, at least, would not want you to take too much notice of the plot. It's a heady mix of police work, crime, politics and history.
That's only the background of course! It's also excellent, suspenseful drama, thanks to the writing and acting. As well as the always compelling performances from regulars Kevin Whatley and Laurence Fox, at the top of their game, there is a most affecting portrayal by Anna Chancellor, showing a range of complex emotions in a difficult role.
There's also a chance to see an early Lucy Boynton, now a star of the cinema. Those, like myself, who have been long-term fans of Cherie Lunghi since her days at the Royal Shakespeare Company, can relish seeing her here in a typically elegant but also rather scary role.
There's a nice cameo from Lorcan Cranitch and a compelling performance by Mark Aiken. Dramatic tension is maintained through numerous plot twists but space is still left for the welcome touches of humour that always lighten each episode of Lewis.
Really not to be missed!
Ghost Adventures: Westerfeld House (2018)
Spooky 1960s!
If the "evidence" produced on Ghost Adventures often seems underwhelming, we are at least taken to some fascinating locations and this episode is no exception.
This is the only chance you will get to visit this particular property, Westerfeld House, on the corner of Scott and Fulton in San Francisco and get a glimpse of that period in the 1960s when the Church of Satan was fashionably shocking and attracted Hollywood celebrities like actress Jayne Mansfield.
The only other property associated with the Church at that time, the Black House in San Francisco, has since been demolished and Westerfeld House itself is now privately owned by someone who disavows any interest in its past. Zak did well to get access.
He also shows us what must be a very rare interview with almost the only survivor from that time who lived there, film director Kenneth Anger. He looks a bit of an old wreck himself, which is hardly surprising, when you consider what he and his colleagues got up to in the house. One of them, it is pointed out, was Bobby Beausoleil, still currently incarcerated for the murder he carried out as part of Charles Manson's gang. Manson himself was a frequent visitor, as was the Church's founder, Anton Szandor LaVey.
The programme gives enough references and suggestions to encourage the viewer who may want to follow up with a bit of own research.
Kenneth Anger's movies were regarded as "underground" or cult cinema at the time but popular enough to attract Mick Jagger to provide a soundtrack to the one developed in Westerfield House, called "Invocation of my Demon Brother."
The Church of Satan is these days based in Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan, New York but it's really just a shadow of its former self; just a pretentious club for predominantly male libertines.
So just sit back and enjoy the time travel back into the sinister 1960s!
Law & Order: Criminal Intent: Badge (2002)
Detective, arrest thyself!
By now viewers who have followed this series from the start will have accommodated themselves to its quirks and maybe even come to love them.
The somewhat predictable attitudes of the characters, particularly Eames, which may reflect the ideological prejudices of the writers. The plots "ripped from the headlines" which gives them a compelling immediacy. The implausible semi-omnipotence of Goren in the arts and sciences, Renaissance Man as a middle-ranking police officer. That's before you touch on his genius in criminal psychology which seems to have a 100% success rate as he closes each episode by obtaining a confession of guilt. He's a character you want to be able to believe in but one aspect of his behaviour makes each episode unrealistic and that's never more blatant than in this one.
He's forever interfering in the details of crime scenes. Just because he puts on a pair of latex gloves wouldn't give him the right to compromise the forensics, which would be dealt with a dedicated team in special clothing and have to be confirmed by a post-mortem.
Yet Goren walks all over each crime scene, prodding the corpse and even pulling things out of it. As if he was a qualified expert and the only one necessary. In this episode he even remarks that the crime scene has been interfered with extensively and concludes that the perpetrator must have inside knowledge, indicating that he or she is likely to be a police officer.
Since this is the way he invariably behaves in each episode, perhaps he should arrest himself.
Deadly Possessions: The Conjure Chest and St. Valentines Day Massacre Wall (2016)
Roses are red, violets are blue; just be glad the bullet's not for you!
The conjure chest is both a very sad, personal tragedy and a reminder that voodoo was the last spiritual weapon of an oppressed, transported and enslaved race.
We may think we're familiar with the Saint Valentine's Day massacre but it's still shocking to see the artefacts up close; although a Robert de Niro lookalike almost steals the show!
But let's not forget the pimped-up vintage hearse which looks great fun! Although Zak says he wants it for his own funeral I think you'd have to be alive to enjoy it (or at least undead!)
Ghost Adventures: Star of India (2016)
Shiver me timbers!
If anyone has illusions about the joy of life on the ocean wave in days of yore this will dispel them. Even on such a magnificent and impressively preserved ship as the Star of India. There's horrible accidents to be had, loneliness, despair, guilt and, I thought, a suggestion of other, unspoken nastiness as well. Is it just me or do you also hear a "put me down!" from one young voice?
There's fun as the team volunteers for a small spot of the routine hard work that is involved in crewing a ship.
The special twist in this episode is a visit to an antique shop and the clever improvising of antique ghost detecting equipment: it does appear to work!
The modern high-tech equipment Zak and the boys generally use does sometimes make the ghost hunting seem less scary than it must be for those doing it. Moving round an unfamiliar place in complete darkness would be terrifying for most of us!
Ghost Adventures: Return to the Riviera (2016)
Ace of spades!
One of the ways they keep this series fresh is by varying the format and in this episode they involve volunteers from the public, two of them selected by a draw of cards (of course!). There's even a ghost-hunting dog, with a strapped-on camera.
The real goods though, as usual, are supplied by Zak and his buddies and what they do very well is capture the sadness behind the glamour of Las Vegas, the melancholy of an empty, famous casino-hotel awaiting demolition and the sense of a whole era passing away on The Strip.
At the end, Zak also shows his self-deprecating humour - with the reluctant help of his team!
Ghost Adventures: London Bridge (2020)
London Bridge isn't falling down!
This episode is a good antidote to the widely held myth by us Brits about a con trick being perpetrated on Americans by selling them a bridge from London under false pretences.
It shows the reality and provides an interesting history lesson in the process. One asset of this series is that the presenters don't claim to know everything and are happy to introduce other experts with local knowledge, as is the case here.
The bridge in question is beautifully photographed and this is in stark contrast to the sinister stories associated with it.
Ghost Adventures: Secret Scientology Lab (2016)
That's one scary religion, dude!
This episode has an unusual format in that the first half consists of a no-holds-barred attack on the reputation of the late L Ron Hubbard and his works, from his Dianetics project to the founding of the Church of Scientology. Fascinating facts are introduced, along with much speculation.
It all does make for a much more interesting programme but there is still plenty of time for the usual, mildly scary, antics in the second half and one delightfully amusing, apparently unscripted moment.
This episode would get my vote for the best of the series!
The Good Old Days: Episode #20.5 (1972)
A bubble of happy escapism.
We were told beforehand to ignore the cameras and assured that everyone in the audience would appear on television at least once. This was facilitated by extensive use by the cameramen of the mirrors on the walls.
Rod Hull appeared with his giant puppet Emu, which was silent but funnier than it sounds: he was a popular act on children's television at the time.
Bernard Cribbins was already a legend of stage and screen and a regular favourite on The Good Old Days
The highlight for me, though, was Rita Morris performing a couple of songs, including "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" while on a swing in a rose-covered bower and looking extremely pretty.
Dalziel and Pascoe: Demons on Our Shoulders: Part 1 (2007)
An unpalatable witches brew
It seems often the case that even normally sober police procedural series like to throw in one or two episodes with a hint of the supernatural.
They've certainly not done it by halves here. In fact they've thrown in everything but the kitchen sink, or maybe that should be cauldron. We've got hypnotism, hypnotherapy, Tarot cards, magic as entertainment and escapology, magic as witchcraft. witchcraft as Wicca, satanism and the "left hand path", magic rituals, sex magic, murder as human sacrifice, sigils, pentacles and pentagrams aplenty.
Striving to preside magisterially over this farrago of gothic horror is guest star Richard E Grant as Lee Knight. A nice turn also by Nancy Carroll playing Samantha Mantell; an amusing contrast to the role we are more familiar with her in, as Lady Felicia in the holy and rather twee Father Brown.
There's not so much scope for our usual heroes Dalziel and Pascoe to show their personalities and irreverent wit. This episode suffers as a result and because it seems to take itself too seriously. If I thought it was genuine parody I could have been more understanding.
The Protectors: Goodbye George (1973)
Ciao Contessa!
Don't be fooled by the opening stock shots of New York: all the real action in this episode takes place in Venice. Very pretty it looks too! Which brings me on to Nyree Dawn Porter as Caroline, who shows here that she, of our usual trio, can also carry an episode on her own, albeit with a good supporting cast.
There are some nice touches of humour and even a couple of plot twists, which is quite an achievement in such a compact format. As with many of the episodes, it will probably leave you wishing it lasted longer, which is always a good indication.
The Saint: The Gadget Lovers (1967)
Cod Comrades
This episode is like a parody of a James Bond film. You'll never hear so many comically Russian accents in one place. Even Simon Templar puts one on, while pretending to be a KGB agent: to communicate with other Russian agents in English.
All the other clichés about Soviets and the joys of capitalist life are thrown in. It's still great fun of course. Simon Templar still finds time to play the gallant gentleman and Mary Peach, as Colonel Smolenko, is a lot more appealing than Rosa Kleb.
There is also what must be the cheapest special effect ever: the supposedly explosive sheet of letter paper.
Not to mention the Chinese soldiers using English as a lingua franca to talk to the Soviets.
The episode is at least a reflection of the new geopolitical realities of the era in which it was made, with the hostility between the Chinese and Soviet versions of Communism.
The Protectors: Lena (1973)
Ciao Bella!
All that's best about the series is in this episode. Taut, exciting plot with political overtones. Glamorous location: Venice looks great in all the shots. Smartly dressed characters, not least John Thaw, here playing a suave villain, just a couple of years before he became the rough & tough detective Jack Regan in The Sweeney.
The House of Eliott: Episode #1.8 (1991)
Brains, planes and automobiles
All the things we love this series for are here: the emotional drama but most of all the frocks and props. This episode also has vintage cars and planes to admire.
The only absurdity is the single-person biplane that is supposedly taking several passengers and their luggage to Paris. Even if they were lying flat on top of each other they would hardly fit in. Not that anyone would miss the view, since there are no windows in the body of the plane: always a bit of a giveaway, that! And you thought that budget airlines were a modern invention?
The Protectors: A Pocketful of Posies (1973)
Less than a full pocket
This is one for pop fans. Eartha Kitt's singing is the best thing about this episode. The house party with the table - top dancing granny is also quite fun.
The next best thing is the guest appearance by Kate O'Mara. The plot itself is feeble and developed unusually slowly, so that the ending appears suddenly tacked-on with no real preparation.
Kojak: No License to Kill (1978)
The Two Musketeers
This episode turned out to be far more enjoyable than i expected.
It starts with what looks like an unproductive rivalry between the NYPD's 53rd Precinct, The Bronx, and our heroes of the 11th Precinct, Manhattan South.
Kojak also has a new, junior assistant traveling with him.
There are several nice reminders of what a multicultural mix is New York.
Not for the first time in this series, the police have to try and save foolish, stubborn members of the public who can't see what danger they are in.
The Protectors: Blockbuster (1974)
Not-so-Sweet Blockbuster
This episode lacks the glamorous locations we came to expect with this series. Here it's mainly the scrapyards and industrial sites of London. The plot seems clumsily contrived as well.
A rather downbeat end to the series. Perhaps it was time.
The Protectors: Petard (1973)
The Protectors clean up
It is laughable trying to graft the aura of international espionage and sophistication on to a plot about industrial espionage in a cleaning products company but that's no reason not to enjoy this episode if you're a Protectors fan.
As well as our favourite glamorous heroes, there's a cameo from Carry On legend Angela Douglas as a secretary and there's the future Mrs Boswell from the Liver Birds playing a rather sexy looking office cleaner.
The car phone must have been the height of sophistication for the time and plays a suitably crucial role.
Blitz on Hamburg (2014)
A worthy gem of a documentary
This documentary has a strangely archaic feel to it, as though it was made sometime between the 1940s and 1970s. The key difference being that most of the interviewees that were available were children during the events described. Not that it makes their testimonies less moving; quite the contrary. The use of dubbing instead of subtitles for the German interviews is disappointing, though.
There is plenty of dramatic archive footage and the film is very worthy. For anyone with an interest in Hamburg, such as a tourist and business visitor like me, it is definitely worth a look.
Foyle's War: Elise (2015)
Hilda steals the show!
Really, Ellie Haddington's character, Hilda, steals this episode (even among what is a cast of outstanding performances.) It's a very sensitive portrayal by Miss Haddington. One of the enchantments of this series has been seeing her character develop.
In a similar vein has been the change in Tim McMullan's character, Arthur Valentine, and his relationship with Foyle. It has gone from antagonism at the start of the seventh season to mutual respect and even friendship in the last two episodes.
Perhaps here is a good point to mention one discrepancy. The surname of the character of Hilda, as given in the screen credits, changes from Pearce, for the character's first appearance in the third episode of the second season, "War Games," to Pierce by the last episode.
In the last two seasons, The Times is shown as virtually the house journal of MI5. An "In Memoriam - Private" announcement for the fictional character of Hilda Pierce appeared in The Times of 18 February 2015. The quotation used was from T.S. Elliot's poem "Ash Wednesday ". This poem would have been familiar to Foyle, as he mentions it in the third episode of the first season, "A Lesson in Murder."