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TV
If you only watch one, make it …
Stranger Things
Netflix
Summed up in a sentence The blockbusting sci-fi franchise returns to chronicle Hawkins residents’ final epic battle with Vecna’s forces of the Upside Down.
What our reviewer said “With each of the four episodes running on from the previous one, we have a five-hour action-comedy-horror movie, where each part of the story is luxuriously stretched.” Jack Seale
Further reading ‘It’s time for it to end’: the stars of Stranger Things open up about their final, epic season
Pick of the rest
Poison Water
BBC iPlayer
Summed up in a sentence A damning documentary about the 80s Cornwall residents whose tap water caused Britain’s biggest mass poisoning – and their painful fight for justice.
What our reviewer said “Taking a four-decade step back from events casts them in a different light. And there are enough new interviews here – with residents, experts and politicians – to bring the whole thing startlingly, discomfitingly into the present.” Hannah J Davies
The Beatles Anthology
Disney+
Summed up in a sentence The seminal 90s Beatles docuseries is digitally enhanced, and rereleased alongside a bonus episode.
What our reviewer said “Essentially, The World at War but about the band that made Maxwell’s Silver Hammer, The Beatles Anthology is a meticulously assembled collage of all available footage of the Beatles, interspersed with contemporary interviews that were apparently conducted over a long enough period to encompass a genuinely giddy array of facial hair (George Harrison), haircuts (Ringo Starr) and dye-jobs (Paul McCartney).” Stuart Heritage
Further reading Stuart Maconie on why our opinions about the Beatles keep changing
Chris Hemsworth: A Road Trip to Remember
Disney+
Summed up in a sentence The movie star goes on a heartbreaking journey through his childhood haunts with his dad – in an attempt to slow his father’s dementia.
What our reviewer said “Not just a programme about Chris’s horror at losing his father of today, but a moving treatise on his sadness at letting go, as every grownup must, of the person his parent used to be, the one who gave him his childhood.” Jack Seale
You may have missed …
Frauds
ITVX
Summed up in a sentence Suranne Jones and Jodie Whittaker put in astonishing performances as conwomen bent on pulling off one last job.
What our reviewer said “You get all the satisfactions of a Thomas Crown Affair-ish caper – executed with no shortage of brio and admirable willingness to skate over rampant absurdities – plus a mesmerisingly intricate portrait of a friendship.” Lucy Mangan
Film
If you only watch one, make it …
Blue Moon
In cinemas now
Summed up in a sentence Ethan Hawke plays lyricist Lorenz Hart as he spirals into vinegary jilted despair after his split from Richard Rodgers in Richard Linklater’s Broadway breakup drama.
What our reviewer said “The movie tells us about something rarely touched on in films: the terrible overlap between professional and romantic failure. Yet at some level, Hart is defiantly aware that what he has achieved will survive. It’s a terrific performance from Hawke.” Peter Bradshaw
Further reading Ethan Hawke and Richard Linklater on Blue Moon and their 32-year friendship
Pick of the rest
Pillion
In cinemas now
Summed up in a sentence Alexander Skarsgård and Harry Melling play unlikely lovers in a BDSM biker romance adapted from Adam Mars-Jones’s novel Box Hill.
What our reviewer said “First-time feature director Harry Lighton has created something funny and touching and alarming – like a cross between Alan Bennett and Tom of Finland with perhaps a tiny smidgen of what could be called a BDSM Wallace and Gromit.” Peter Bradshaw
Further reading ‘I think my mum’s going to like it’: Alexander Skarsgård on his gay biker ‘dom-com’ Pillion
Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery
In cinemas now; Netflix from 12 December
Summed up in a sentence Daniel Craig returns as private eye Benoit Blanc in the latest Knives Out murder mystery with a religious undercurrent, and a strong cast including Josh O’Connor, Glenn Close and Josh Brolin.
What our reviewer said “As with the previous two Knives Out films, the enjoyment is, for me, most intense before the actual murder itself, when we see the characters joust and spark unencumbered by murder and suspicion.” Peter Bradshaw
Further reading Glenn Close on growing up in a cult, marching against Trump – and being unlucky in love
Zodiac Killer Project
In selected cinemas now
Summed up in a sentence Charlie Shackleton’s would-be film about 70s serial murderer turns into critique of true crime after original documentary is aborted.
What our reviewer said “If Laurence Sterne made a true-crime documentary it might resemble this exasperating, sometimes negligible but also often amusing and rather insightful personal work from British film-maker Shackleton.” Peter Bradshaw
Further reading How my failed attempt to make a Zodiac Killer film took me to the dark heart of true crime
Now streaming
Dracula
On digital from 1 December
Summed up in a sentence Another film version of Bram Stoker’s story, directed by Luc Besson and starring Caleb Landry Jones as the undead count and Christoph Waltz as his hunter.
What our reviewer said “Besson’s lavishly upholstered vampire romance has ambition and panache – and in all its Hammer-y cheesiness, I’m not sure I don’t prefer to it to Robert Eggers’s recent, solemnly classy version of Nosferatu.” Peter Bradshaw
Books
If you only read one, make it …
The School of Night by Karl Ove Knausgård, translated by Martin Aitken
Reviewed by Charles Arrowsmith
Summed up in a sentence The latest instalment in the Norwegian author’s sprawling addictive series of supernatural existentialism.
What our reviewer said “As in the first three books, the author’s philosophical preoccupation with death is a constant, expressed through the tension between an instinctual materialism and the haunting possibility of something beyond comprehension.”
Further reading Karl Ove Knausgård on the fallout from My Struggle and the dark side of ambition
Pick of the rest
Holbein: Renaissance Master by Elizabeth Goldring
Reviewed by Kathryn Hughes
Summed up in a sentence A magnificent portrait of the Tudor court painter.
What our reviewer said “His great achievement was to bring before us the living, breathing men and women who plotted, suffered, contrived and triumphed through the most terrifying decades of English history”
The Matchbox Girl by Alice Jolly
Reviewed by Natasha Walter
Summed up in a sentence The ethics of Dr Asperger in second world war Vienna, as seen by a mute autistic girl.
What our reviewer said “This is a book that walks a tightrope between sentimentality and honesty, between realism and imagination, and creates something spirited and memorable as it does so.”
Further reading How could Hans Asperger have collaborated with the Nazis?
Bog People: A Working-Class Anthology of Folk Horror edited by Hollie Starling
Reviewed by Catriona Ward
Summed up in a sentence Dark tales of English myth and magic from 10 leading authors.
What our reviewer said “Human relationships are not always the most important ones here. The writers and their protagonists are in conversation with the past, with the land, with the polarising and sometimes toxic nature of national identity.”
Further reading ‘It’s insanely sinister’: horror writers on the scariest stories they’ve ever read
You may have missed …
The Artist by Lucy Steeds
Reviewed by Christobel Kent
Summed up in a sentence Waterstones’ book of the year sees a young English journalist gain entry to the house of a reclusive artist in post-war Provence.
What our reviewer said “A seductive combination of romance, puzzle and poetry, The Artist also offers a considered interrogation of the value of art: to open windows in human existence, to push against limits, to bring freedom, perspective and light.”
Further reading The Artist by Lucy Steeds wins Waterstones book of the year
Albums
If you only listen to one, make it …
The Durutti Column: The Return of the Durutti Column
Out now
Summed up in a sentence A deluxe reissue of the band’s debut album, whose delicate experimentation was ahead of its time in the post-punk-tinged early 80s.
What our reviewer said “Perhaps the peculiar circumstances of its creation – people experimenting for their own benefit, rather than actively making an album for public consumption – helped forge its distinctly beguiling atmosphere.” Alexis Petridis
Pick of the rest
HTRK: String of Hearts (Songs of HTRK)
Out now
Summed up in a sentence Sharon Van Etten, Stephen O’Malley, Perila and more transform the veteran duo’s gloomy, sensual songs on an album of covers and remixes.
What our reviewer said This brilliant, genre-agnostic record allows you to trace the breadth of the Melbourne band’s shapeshifting sound, echoes of which can now be found all over underground and commercial music, without leaning too hard on nostalgia. Safi Bugel
Further reading HTRK turn 21: ‘Whenever I met fans I could tell they were a bit shocked I wasn’t the gothic lord’
Tognetti/Australian Chamber Orchestra: Beethoven & Brahms – Violin Concertos
Out now
Summed up in a sentence This 50th anniversary live recording of two great concertos are a wonderful souvenir of a remarkable group.
What our reviewer said “Even if these performances do not rival the finest of the myriad other versions on disc, they are thoroughly convincing”. Andrew Clements
Ikonika: Sad
Out now
Summed up in a sentence The dancefloor producer weaves seductive and steely lyrics with their trademark production in a convincing embrace of pop.
What our reviewer said “Listening to Sad feels a little like reading someone’s journal, full of earnest middle-of-the-night thoughts and raw desire. Its mission statement arrives early on: ‘Are you even listening? Listen to your heart.’ Shaad D’Souza
Now touring …
The Hives
Alexandra Palace, London, 29 November
Summed up in a sentence Twenty-five years on from their first UK tour, the Swedish band are at their snarling best.
What our reviewer said “Pulling 10 tracks from their recent LPs, the revelation is how strong their new material is live. As cartoonish as they can be, the Hives are obviously hungry to prove themselves again rather than settling into the numbing comfort of nostalgia.” Dave Simpson
