The Best Silent Witnesses

Divided Loyalties. Niall Leonard. Dead woman and baby. Drugs. 'Stukie'.

The World Cruise. Tony McHale. Auschwitz resurfaces.

The Fall Out. Tony McHale. Multiple vehicle pile up. And a spare arm.

Closed Ranks. Tony McHale, Season 6. Leo's wife and daughter are visiting when a case similar to one of his old ones appears.

Answering Fire. Dusty Hughes. Fire in hotel. Dodgy politician.

Choices. Doug Milburn. Harry befriends kid who's involved in night club drive by shooting.

Cargo. Doug Milburn. Boat of illegals capsize. Infectious disease on board, and little missing girl who Nikki just will not give up on.

Body of Work. Rhidian Brook, Season 10. Harry and Nikki are starting to get it on when an old flame of Harry's turns up dead.

Schism. Christian Spurrier. A bit far-fetched, but Nikki is kidnapped.

Hippocratic Oath. Tony McHale. Two bodies in one coffin...

Shadows. Dudi Appleton and Jim Keeble. Killing spree at Uni. Season 13.

Bloodline. Dudi Appleton and Jim Keeble again. Harry in The Third Man. 

Death Has No Dominion. Ed Whitmore. 'The wraith'!

And Then I Fell In Love. Timothy Prager. Young girls being groomed. Season 15 finale - Harry's last appearance in one of the toughest to watch.

Then lost its edge a bit, Harry sorely missed.

Perks up in Seasons 20 / 21. Awakening. Dudi Appleton & Jim Keeble. Nikki buried alive in Mexico. One Day, Timothy Prager. Abuse in care home. Family. Michael Crompton. The Christmas Special!

The Other Bennet Sister (2026)

Based on a novel by Janice Hadlow, adapted mainly by Sarah Quintrell (and Maddie Dai), directed by Jennifer Sheridan and Asim Abbasi. Am I enjoying 10 x 30 for BBC? I'm not sure really. I find Ella Broccoli too dithery, says 'er' too much. Her name's not that really, it's Ella Bruccoleri. I find her suitors somehow annoying. And it has this triumvirate of horrible characters: 1. Her mum (Ruth Jones). 2. One of her sisters and 3. Mr Darcy's sister Tanya Reynolds.

Indira Varma, Laurie Davidson, Richard Coyle, Donal Finn, Maddie Close, Poppy Gilbert, Grace Hogg-Robinson (who we've just seen in Silent Witness), Ryan Sampson (of course, from Mr Bigstuff), Richard E Grant.

Silent Witness season finale (2018)

Family. Michael Crompton, director Colin Teague. First broadcast in February 2018 - they should have brought it forward as a Christmas Special.. which it definitely is. It's Christmas Day, no less, and the team are summoned to an ultra-modern house populated by dead bodies. And it's partly how their own lives are disrupted and reflected in this tale of a family gone mad. It's also unique in that the gang are all miked up and live streamed, so there's a very cinema verité angle to the opening, a tense scene interrupted by an unidentified shooter and an injured girl (and horse).

Stukie's back, and he's up to something. Also with Natasha Little, Grace Hogg-Robinson, Steve Evets.

Stukie talking them through what might have happened

Photographed by Jan-Richter Friis, edited by Mark Thornton.

Materialists (Celine Song & scr, prod)

We know that NYC matchmaker Dakota Johnson's view of perfect couples is all wrong but it takes the whole film to catch on she should be with Chris Evans - he's better looking than Pedro Pascal too.

Song directs with formality and isn't afraid to leave characters in long takes and medium shot. She takes great care with scenes too - for example the wedding dance the couple find themselves in the middle of, and that tree behind Evans' head at the end.

We thought it was great, didn't even realise Song (Past Lives) had another film out and funnily enough, I was thinking this reminded me in tone of Lost in Translation, something that applied to the earlier film too.

With Zoe Winters, Marin Ireland, Dasha Nevrasova, Emmy Wheeler, Louisa Jacobson, Eddie Cahill, Sawyer Spielberg (son of). DP Shabier Kirchmer, editor Keith Fraase return from the previous film. Daniel Pemberton's score has a nice way of keeping it going.

I like the way Johnson's handled her career, no doubt supported by her mum and dad Melanie Griffiths and Don Johnson.

A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (1945 Elia Kazan)

Some of Leon Shamroy's lighting of rain patterns on Dorothy Maguire almost foreshadows Conrad Hall's in In Cold Blood.

Expert direction of actors - you sense he's been allowed time to rehearse with them - lots of long takes, but Dorothy Spencer knows how to cut it together too.

See here for more considered jottings.

No Hard Feelings (2023 Gene Stupnitsky & co-scr)

To get a car, Jennifer Lawrence agrees to date 19 year old Andrew Barth Feldman and 'make a man' of him - she starts out by coming over far too strong. Then the inevitable happens.

Scene where Lawrence mounts stairs in roller skates is so stupid I almost puked. Highlight: stark naked Lawrence beating up kids who've stolen their clothes.

With Laura Benanti, Matthew Broderick, Natalie Morales (The Morning Show), Scott MacArthur.

生きる / Ikiru / To Live (1952 Akira Kurosawa & co-scr)

Takashi Shimura is absolutely wonderful as Mr Watanabe, 'the mummy' who has drowned in bureaucracy but slowly wakes up to life when he learns he's dying. He's assisted by a cheap novelist Yunosuke Ito and a young free-spirited girl, Miki Odagiri. But even she gets bored with his company. There's a great scene where he confesses his illness to the girl while contradictory happy music plays to accompany a birthday party behind them. And he tries to tell his son and daughter in law what's going on but they just think he's having an affair with the girl.

He dies, and in an increasingly drunken wake, his colleagues begin to realise why he so pushed for the development of a playground, and all promise to behave more humanely.. naturally, the following morning, all is forgotten. Great flashback where Watanabe will not be pushed around by gangster because he has nothing to lose. So it's as much a critique of bureaucracy as a lesson in appreciating life.

Photographed by Asakazu Nakai.

Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994 Mike Newell)

It is unfortunate that the key scene where Kristin Scott Thomas reveals to Hugh Grant she loves him is very slightly out of focus - I imagine they thought the take was so good they'd just go with it. Michael Coulter's the DP, Chris Plevin's the focus puller.

Not this one...

...this one.

The vicar's line before the wedding - "Ready to face the enemy?" - is funny because it's so wrong.

Defending Your Life (1991 Albert Brooks & scr)

Although the food arrives instantly, and is as good as you've ever eaten, it does seem somewhat bizarre (omelette served with strawberries, roast chicken with multicoloured pasta, carrots and peas).

Michael Grillo is the producer and first AD, a useful fellow, worked extensively with Laurence Kasdan.

Zulu (1964 Cy Endfield & co-scr)

Enjoyable recreation of battle at Rourke's Drift, 1863, filmed in Natal by Stephen Dade almost entirely in deep focus (a good idea). This is by far the best known of his films. The widescreen suits the material well.

Stanley Baker and Michael Caine are the officers, Nigel Greene good as sergeant. With Jack Hawkins, Ulla Jacobsson, James Booth, Ivor Emmanuel, Paul Daneman, Patrick Magee. Richard Burton narrates. Kept thinking I saw James Fox - didn't. Couldn't help but feel the Zulu warriors weren't presented as well as they might be. Best moments are the huge vocal sounds of the Zulu army.

Just because the women are African, the British censor allowed topless female nudity, which seems bizarre indeed.

John Barry wrote the score and John Jympson edited. 

Tomorrow Is Forever (1946 Irving Pichel)

 We thought Welles could have looked worse, scars for example.

Claudette Colbert. Orson Welles, George Brent, Natalie Wood (her debut), Ian Wolfe, Lucile Watson, Richard Long (also the Stranger, Dark Mirror, Criss Cross).

It's... y'know -

Silent Witness (2018)

A woman loses it behind the wheel, crashes and dies. Her son is in a care home, where awful things are going on. In parallel a dead dementia patient is found to have been overdosed, and there's (eventually) a link to the care home. One Day was written by Timothy Prager (he did the social work episode Protection as well, the grooming one And Then I Fell in Love, Safe, gang violence in Brixton, and Identity, immigrant crisis) and it's another disturbing one, buoyed by excellent performances from Toby Sams-Friedman and Rosie Jones, and from Charlie Creed-Miles and Sara Powell. A lyrical moment at the Great Conservatory at Syon House turns sour when police marksmen get involved.

This Life (1996 Amy Jenkins)

Meet yuppie lawyers Jack Davenport, Amita Dhiri, Andrew Lincoln, Daniela Nardini and Jason Hughes.

Silent Witness - Season 21 (2018)

Duty of Candour (whatever that means) by Matthew Arlidge. Seemingly random murders are in fact linked to a data theft at a large hospital, a hospital where it just so happens Nikki is receiving counselling for her ongoing PTSD. Dodgy head of hospital Nitin Ganatra is up to something.

Jack has time for a little romance with Kiza Dean, who's investigating, but finally manages to reconcile with Nikki.

The DP is Vanessa Whyte (did some of the Ted Lasso series, A Confession series with Martin Freeman in 2019) and the editor Anna Dick.

A Special Relationship, Graham Mitchell. The murder of a US embassy executive brings them team into contact with government operatives including Michael Landes (Love Soup) and Ellis's Sharon D Clarke. Nikki and he have a thing but he's kidnapped, though for some reason that I didn't comprehend doesn't become a murder victim. A troubled man Jefferson Hall is at the centre of things and there's a quasi-mystical ending where he sees a dead women and hears things he couldn't possibly have heard. Hm.

You notice we've switched from 1.85:1 to 2.0:1

The Duchess of Duke Street (1976 John Hawkesworth)

Producer Hawkesworth brings his Upstairs Downstairs sensibilities to the BBC, as chef Gemma Jones defies the upper classes for her shot in early twentieth century London.

We seem to have missed the beginning (only the opening episode thankfully) and find herself already having made a good impression with a Major, Michael Culver (Roland's son) and Lord Bryan Coleman, but is pressed into marrying butler Donald Burton so she can be mistressed out to the Prince of Wales, Roger Hammond. That I find a bit much.

Familiar faces in June Brown, John Raply, Doreen mantle, John Welsh.

Silent Witness - Out and In (2017/8)

Dudi Appleton and Jim Keeble were brought in to write the 20th series finale Awakening, which Dudi directed. It's one of those in-a-strange-land ones, and especially being a finale you worry someone's not going to make it.

We're in an extremely dangerous part of Mexico, Sinoloa (actually the Canary Islands!) A former colleague of Nikki's has been killed but there's no body. She was connected to a group trying to reunite families with 30,000 people lost to the cartels. Jack joins her to try and track what happened to her and co-workers who have gone missing, and are present when a horribly tattooed murderer is arrested - can he help them find the missing workers? He's Rick Genest and the tattoos were real - he was something of a celebrity. With Raquel Cassidy, Ben Cura.

Nikki ends up kidnapped and buried alive. Jack goes out of his mind trying to find her. (They have mobile phone contact but she's running out of battery and air.) When he thinks he's failed there's a fade to black - a merciless black which seems to go on forever, like we're going to get the end credits music. But then mercifully we are back on to Nikki... and her escape.

And the farewell message she left on the phone - that the team were like her family - will never be heard. Little nods to Harry (in dialogue) and Leo (quick flashback) were also poignantly placed.

So yes, a good season finale and an onscreen tribute was given to all the people who had worked on the first twenty series. Editor Al Morrow does some good stuff with the missing colleague Elena Saurel.

So in Season 21, episode 1, in which Ed Whitmore plays his usual hand at throwing lots of characters and stories at you, Nikki is off work recovering and Jack's not communicating with her. Q gets it at once - he feels guilty for not saving her, but as she says 'We're still here!'

Nikki is lured back by Alex Macqueen who thinks pathologist Julian Rhind-Tutt may have something to do with the disappearance of his colleague.

A Triple Bill of Silent Witnesses (2017)

Discovery. Ed Whitmore. A woman is knocked off her bike and kidnapped. Does this connect to the family that live next door? And what's this got to do with the death of an ex addict? The solution of  the latter, involving air bags, is ingenious; otherwise I was quite confused throughout.

Remembrance. Graham Mitchell. A Body is found in the river. It links to another death three years before involving an over-emoting Sarah Smart, who latches onto Nikki. And some angry young men.

Covenant. Richard Davidson. Man and son are run off the road and killed. Was the man's brother, fresh out of prison, connected? (Lee Ross.) We're led to believe it's a military operation, but the gunman isn't a great shot. Turns out there's a Strangers on the Train back story. and we meet Clarissa's husband, Daniel Weyman, who's an IT expert.

This Happy Breed (1944 David Lean)

 

Alison Leggatt and Guy Verney

The Aeronauts (2019 Tom Harper & co-scr)

He came up with the story; Jack Thorne helped him adapt it.

Eddie Redmayne and Felicity Jones are a great team. She's as good as he is - probably better. I thought she was award-worthy. Didn't get nominated for anything. The film is unusual in that there's no romantic plot at all.

Splendidly photographed by George Steel in 2.39 on the ground and 1.85: 1 in the air. The main balloon action was filmed in a 100 x 100 foot bluescreen stage with 360 degree lighting. Some of the changes in climate were created with a box filled with smoke in front of the light source. It looks fabulous. Louis Morin is the VFX supervisor (he describes it as the 'department of miracles').

Mark Eckerberg edited. Great sound as well.

The Best of Enemies (2019 Robin Bissell & scr)

Taraji Henson and Sam Rockwell are predictably good as real life characters; Babou Ceesay (We Hunt Together) is charmingly effective as the negotiator.

It had a cinema release but was then pretty much rushed to DVD - though it still hasn't had a Region 2 release - why not??

Good screenplay. Bissell was an associate / executive producer on Pleasantville and Seabiscuit, which may explain Tobey Maguire's role as producer on this. He hasn't managed to do anything since.