Jaws (1975 Steven Spielberg)

As it was 4th July. 1776 might have been more appropriate but who wants to see a seventies musical about the founding of the United Sates of America?

I was wondering if there's a textual link to Herman Melville, 'Moby Dick'. Isn't this the story of a slightly crazy (Quint smashing the radio?) sea captain in obsessive pursuit of a dangerous sea creature?

I'm sure I heard somewhere that when the truck 'dies' in Duel, there's the sound of an animal on the soundtrack, and that this same sound was used when the shark is exploded and sinks. It's a very artful soundtrack / mix / sound effects worthy of study on its own.

In the 1986 Halliwell Film Guide, the old git writes "despite genuinely suspenseful and frightening sequences, it is a slackly narrated and sometimes flatly handled thriller with an over-abundance of dialogue"... What a load of shit! He gives it ** out of ****, whereas if you cast your eye up, the cheesy Harryhausen picture Jason and the Argonauts gets ***!

Thomas & Sarah (1978 - 1979 Alfred Shaughnessy)

Pauline Collins and John Alderton reteamed as characters from Upstairs Downstairs, negotiating life with car dealers, jewel thieves and Chinese magicians. Great episode 'The Biter Bit' where they end up at a posh country house party, pretending to do 'common' accents - and it's a great laugh, until Thomas is seduced by the Lady of the house and Sarah falls in with a penniless twerp - they end up apart, having also had their Rolls Royce stolen!

Familiar style and writers from Updown.

Trying - Season 4 (2024 Andy Wolton)

Shouldn't really be called Trying any more, unless it's about trying to be parents. OK, so it can be called Trying then. Rafe Spall and Esther Smith now have teenager Scarlett Rayner and Cooper Turner, the former wishing to track down her birth mum. With Darren Boyd and Sian Brooke (good), Phil Davies, Marion McLoughlin, Roderick Smith.

It's rather sillier than Breeders e.g. Boyd claiming he's going to row the Atlantic. And ends on a cliffhanger with Scarlett's mother (Charlotte Riley) turning up.

Clocking Off - Season 4 (2003, Various)

Moral dilemmas and unresolved situations are never better portrayed in the Mark Benton story. He realises there's something wrong with his challenged, institutionalised younger brother Craig Heaney. He finds out it's his violent and brutal 'carer' who he kills in self-defence. The brother is accused and even though Benton confesses they still don't believe him and the brother gets 10 years, whilst the real culprit gets off with it. He should have phoned the police immediately - no doubt other victims would have come forward. But this is Clocking Off and people behave 'realistically'. I think I'm quite looking forward to the end of all these 'real' people behaving 'realistically'.

What else is going on? Pam Ferris is the good new boss who makes it work despite her useless husband (Keith Barron) dying at the eleventh hour. Jack Deam develops epilepsy after being run over by Branka Katic, and Nicola Stephenson runs away from her marriage to Derek Riddell.

Then in the finale all the cast appear in a grand song and dance routine. Not. No, the last two cover racism (from all angles) and then a weird finale in which Freda (Joan Kempson) starts behaving very weirdly indeed and almost causes the factory to go bust.

One Life (2023 James Hawes)

The true story of Nicky Winton, who in 1938-9 helped evacuate several hundred at risk children from Czechoslovakia before the Nazis politely ushered them into death camps. (We hear that of the 15,000 sent there, only 200 survived.) Written by Lucinda Coxon (Wild Target) and Nick Drake, based on Winton's daughter's book 'If It's Not Impossible...The Life of Sir Nicholas Winton'. He is played by Anthony Hopkins in 1987 (with Lena Olin as his wife) and Johnny Flynn as the younger version (with Helena Bonham Carter as his mother). The ending, in which he meets some of the survivors, is emotional.

Samantha Sipro is Esther Rantzen. And Betty Maxwell is Marthe Keller! With Romola Garai, Alex Sharp, Juliana Moska, Tom Glenister (son of Robert).

Flynn we know - he was Fleming in Operation Mincemeat and was also in Emma. and The Clouds of Sils Maria, Vanity Fair, The Dig.

It was photographed by Zac Nicholson (Misbehaviour, The Death of Stalin, David Copperfield) , edited by Lucia Zucchetti (Their Finest, Boy A, Ratcatcher), music by Volker Bertelmann, production designer Christina Moore. The Czech Republic was played by itself.

The Peanut Butter Falcon (2019 Tyler Nilson, Michael Schwartz & scr)

A sweet indie road movie / coming of friends, not the most original story line (harks back to Huck Finn) but with the twist that the hero of the piece is a Downs Syndrome actor Zack Gottsagen. He befriends Shia LaBeouf after escaping Dakota Johnson and Bruce Dern in a retirement home. They're pursued by John Hawkes (True Detective 4, Three Billboards, Winter's Bone) and some other dude. John Bernthal is the dead brother and Thomas Haden Church the wrestler (knew I recognised him but couldn't place him).

Nigel Bluck is on widescreen camera duties filming Georgia, which looks like the Florida it's above. Editing by Kevin Tent and Nat Fuller.

I presume the ending touch, where the boy throws the wrester out of the ring a touch of 'magical realism' - it doesn't quite work for me.

The directors had only made shorts before this. Their new one is Los Frikis, set in 1990s Cuba.

Sleepers (1996 Barry Levinson & scr)

Levinson adapted Lorenzo Carcaterra's supposedly true story of four friends from Hell's Kitchen who were brutalized and raped in a New York Detention Center for Boys in the 1960s. This allegation was completely refuted by the NYC authorities. I couldn't work out what drew Levinson to this material, but whether true or not it's an immersive story.

Joe Perrino, Brad Renfro, Jonathan Tucker and Geoffrey Wigdor are the kids who grow up to be Jason Patric (a journalist), Matt Damon (a lawyer), Billy Crudup and John Eldard (hardened criminals). When the latter encounter one of their persecutors, Kevin Bacon, they kill him. Damon finds out a clever way to get them off, and to track down and take revenge on the others.

Great cast also includes Minnie Driver, Dustin Hoffman, Bruno Kirby (the most unpleasant husband you can think of), Robert de Niro, Wendell Pierce, Aida Turturro and Vittorio Gassman (the original Profumo di Donna) as the local hood.

Very well made by Levinson, Michael and Florian Ballhaus, Stu Linder, Richard Beggs, and Kristi Zea (production design) with a great score from John Williams. Greenpoint in Brooklyn stands in for the now refurbished Hell's Kitchen.