Archive for April, 2023
A review of the book “Black And British” by David Olusoga
April 12th, 2023 by Roger Darlington
There are many way of presenting the history of a nation. One is through a series of great characters and, in the case of British history, this is typically kings and queens. Another is through a series of great events and, in the instance of British history, this could be characterised as ‘1066 and all […]
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A review of the 2016 film “The Whole Truth”
April 11th, 2023 by Roger Darlington
This is a courtroom drama that follows the standard tropes of the genre. It is Louisiana and a man has been murdered; his son confesses to the crime and it seems like an open and shut case. But this is a movie so we know that it is not going to be as simple as […]
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A review of the 1963 epic “Cleopatra”
April 8th, 2023 by Roger Darlington
Was “Cleopatra” a classic? Well, it was far from being a brilliant movie, but it deserves to be appreciated for its infamously troubled production and its gloriously grand staging. As the film critic David Thomson wrote in his book “Have You Seen …?”: “You have to see ‘Cleopatra’ if you have any remote interest in […]
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The three great crises of Christianity: what is God? what is the Church? what is man?
April 7th, 2023 by Roger Darlington
“The situation was summed up by the Cambridge historian Richard Rex, who suggests that there have been three great crises in the history of the Church. The first, in its early centuries, revolved around the question ‘What is God?’. That is to say: how many natures were in Jesus Christ, how many persons in the […]
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A review of the Chinese film “So Long, My Son”
April 5th, 2023 by Roger Darlington
This 2019 Chinese film is a revelation. It tells the story of two couples, friends and fellow workers at the same factory who have boys on the same day who also become friends. The two couples prove to have very different lives and the actions of the two sons have powerful and long-lasting implications for […]
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A review of the classic novel “Orlando” by Virginia Woolf
April 3rd, 2023 by Roger Darlington
Having seen the 1992 film version with Tilda Swinton in the titular role and the 2022 theatre adaptation starring Emma Corrin, I thought that I would tackle the original 1928 novel. The eponymous hero is a male noble man and poet in the early 17th century who lives until the time of Woolf, about half […]
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