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Saturday Review Podcast bigger text

Saturday Review

Magazines & Reviews

Factual: Arts, Culture & the Media

Sharp, critical discussion of the week's cultural events, with Tom Sutcliffe and guests

Presenter Tom Sutcliffe and guests offer sharp, critical discussion of the week's cultural events

Saturday Review: The Guts; Only God Forgives; Southcliffe; Titanic; Mass Observation

Film Only God Forgives

03/08/2013

The Guts; Only God Forgives; Southcliffe; Titanic; Mass Observation

BBC Radio 4 - Saturday Review, The Guts; Only God Forgives; Southcliffe; Titanic; Mass Observation

Roddy Doyle's The Guts, and Ryan Gosling in Only God Forgives.

A look at the week's cultural highlights. Roddy Doyle's new novel The Guts re-visits The Commitments, and Ryan Gosling stars in Nicolas Winding Refn's film Only God Forgives.

Danish director Nicolas Winding Refn's film Only God Forgives has already divided critics: five stars for some while others booed it at Cannes. Set in Bangkok, it's ultraviolent, awash with red, and has an extraordinary soundscape. It stars Ryan Gosling, Vithaya Pansringarm and Kristin Scott Thomas. 

Roddy Doyle returns to the territory of the much-loved The Commitments - which will become a musical in the autumn - in his new novel The Guts. Jimmy Rabbitte is now 47 and has just been diagnosed with bowel cancer. He's not dying yet... but his brush with mortality leads him to embrace some of the passions of his youth.

Southcliffe is a new Channel 4 drama by Tony Grisoni, starring Rory Kinnear and Shirley Henderson, directed by American Sean Durkin. It's a powerful drama set in a small town in the south east of England where the run-up to a spate of shootings and the terrible grief and consequences of the deaths are played out. 

Titanic was a musical that ran on Broadway just before James Cameron's film came out. It didn't delight the critics but it did delight the crowds and ran for two years, winning five Tony awards. Its huge set cost millions of dollars; now a chamber version at the Southwark Playhouse does wonders with a set of steps and a couple of pieces of rope. Can it win over crowds and critics alike?

Mass Observation: This is Your Photo is a new exhibition at the Photographers' Gallery in London. The Mass Observation movement began in 1937 as a social science experiment cataloguing the lives and tastes of thousands. The material that resulted from its early years is featured alongside reports for the project from more recent years.

Sarfraz Manzoor is joined by Deborah Bull, Kerry Shale and Denise Mina. 

Producer: Sarah Johnson.

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

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The Guts; Only God Forgives; Southcliffe; Titanic; Mass Observation

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