Television
Russell Brown, Fiona Rae
Before the HBO miniseries Chernobyl (Prime, Sunday-Thursday, 8.30pm) premiered this year, its writer, Craig Mazin, told an interviewer that one of the keynotes for his work was the essential, elusive concept of truth.
Although the nuclear accident at the centre of the story happened more than 30 years ago, Mazin said he saw a resonance for a contemporary world “struggling with the global war on the truth. And what we used to think of as the domain of the Soviets – the near-celebration of lies and the press as propaganda – we now realise is not unique to the Soviet state. It’s within ourselves as well here in the West. And it’s here.”
Mazin could hardly have hoped for a more prodigious response. His creation was nominated for 19 Emmys and won 12.
But more than that, it was talked about – not least in Putin’s Russia, where Kremlinfriendly media damned it as inaccurate and insulting, and the NTV channel even announced it was producing its own version of the story (in which the disaster was triggered by a previously
unheralded CIA agent).
Writing in the Moscow Times, Ilya Shepelin surmised that the official response was so furious because Chernobyl was a case of foreigners highlighting “the harrowing and self-sacrificing struggle that the Soviet people waged against the consequences of the explosion”, depicting Russian heroes that Putin’s Kremlin would prefer were forgotten.
In the West, most reviewers took up Mazin’s theme of truth and lies and the dangers of official control of information. But there were naysayers: the reviewer for the left-wing magazine Jacobin complained that “even as we worry about the ongoing ecological crisis caused by capitalism, Chernobyl revels in the failure of the historical alternative to capitalism”. And yet, at the time, the disaster was received, and acted on, as an indictment of nuclear energy itself. In 2019, we’re obliged to consider nuclear power as a partial response to the existential threat of climate change. It’s complicated.
In New Zealand – which, in 1986, was still very much in the throes of its own nuclear moment – viewers without
Sky subscriptions weren’t in a position to join any conversation this year. But that’s about to be remedied. Prime is screening Chernobyl’s five episodes on successive nights from Sunday.
“The celebration of lies and the press as propaganda … is not unique to the Soviet state.”
mini-series. A Bafta, a Golden Globe and an Emmy – all deserved, although you have to feel sorry for Hugh Grant, who was nominated for all three of those awards and is very good as the perfidious Thorpe, the Liberal Party politician who apparently planned to have Scott killed. It’s easy to fill up the PVR with whole seasons, but at just three episodes, this is one box set that is easily digestible.
MONDAY DECEMBER 9
Police Woman (Jones! too, Sky 208, 4.50pm). Holy cow, this takes us back and it turns out our tweenage self wasn’t wrong about Angie Dickinson as badass undercover cop Pepper Anderson. Police Woman was the first really successful hour-long prime-time drama series on US television starring a woman in the lead role, paving the way for countless more leading women. Dickinson received a Golden Globe and three Emmy nominations for the role; at
88, she now resides in Ventura, California.
Psychopath with Piers Morgan (Three, 9.40pm). Stop tittering down the back at the title, you lot. The broadcaster that everyone loves to hate interviews another psycho killer. Considering that Morgan is an empathy-free zone, it’s a distinctly unedifying undertaking. His subject is Paris Bennett, who was 13 when he murdered his four-year-old sister. Bennett is now 25 and may be released in eight years. His mother, Charity – who might have made a more interesting documentary subject – says that she has forgiven him. “I don’t envy you at all,” says a tactless Morgan.
TUESDAY DECEMBER 10
My Floating Home (Choice TV,
10.00pm). Here’s another one for the housing crisis: floating homes, some of the sort that don’t actually move from their moorings. In this British series, Mark Evans meets people who fancy a watery view, from a one-bedroom floating flat to a mansion with hot tubs. If only we had a canal system.
WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 11
Southern Indoor Charity Dog Trials (Country TV, Sky 081, 8.00pm). It’s a bit fancier than A Dog’s Show – there are obstacles such as dog kennels and wine barrels before the sheep get penned – and it takes place indoors at the Southern Field Days in Gore; but still, it’s dogs doing clever things, which there definitely should be
more of on television.
The L Word: Generation Q (SoHo2, Sky 210, 9.30pm).
Even lesbian politics need an update: the series that was so groundbreaking in the early 2000s now looks a wee bit … well, early-2000s. “The world has changed; we’ve learnt a great deal, I’ve learnt a great deal,” creator Ilene Chaiken told NBC. For example, trans characters will be played by trans actors in this newgeneration reboot. For fans, original series characters Bette Porter (Jennifer Beals), Alice Pieszecki (Leisha Hailey) and Shane McCutcheon (Katherine Moennig) appear, but a new set of diverse LGBTQ+ characters will tell stories
of “love, heartbreak, sex, setbacks and success in LA”. Not to ghetto-ise or anything, but Work in Progress (SoHo2, Thursday, 9.00pm) is a new series that is billed as being “a comedy about being out and down”. It’s created by Chicago comedian Abby McEnany, who plays an anxious, despairing 45-year-old whose new relationship is unexpectedly transformative. The series is co-written and executive produced by Lilly Wachowski.
THURSDAY DECEMBER 12
Police Ten 7: Christmas Special (TVNZ 2, 7.30pm). A Christmas “special”? Because crime is hilarious? The good, the bad and the ugly from the past year, we suppose, and Rob Lemoto has an unsolved case. Seasons greetings, everyone.
Life Is Easy (TVNZ OnDemand). It’s a feature of the modern television scene that reputations are being built and careers made on the back of web series, and here’s another local creation
– a body-swap comedy in which best friends Jamie Lee (Chye-Ling Huang) and Curtis (Cole Jenkins) wake up in each other’s bodies after their joint 27th birthday bash. As she is Chinese, straight and female and he is Pākehā, gay and male, we like the possibilities. All eight 15-minute episodes will be available from today.
Churchill and the Movie Mogul (Sky Arts, Sky 020, 8.30pm). Hitler had Leni Riefenstahl, but Churchill had Alexander Korda, suggests this BBC documentary, which is a fascinating exploration of Churchill’s friendship with Hungarian-Jewish émigré Korda, a celebrated film producer. Korda employed Churchill in 1934 as a screenwriter and historical adviser, but when war broke out, Korda was sent to Hollywood to help bring America into the fray. Korda produced such wartime movies as 1941’s Lady Hamilton and gave MI6 agents cover stories as film employees.
Stone (Sandra Bullock) and astronaut Matt Kowalski (George Clooney) repair the Hubble Space Telescope, which, if you didn’t know, orbits the Earth about every 95 minutes. That’s fast, and it’s cosmic velocity that drives the action of Gravity. The acting is also superb and the visuals breathtaking. Apparently, the science doesn’t hold up under scrutiny, but that didn’t stop director Alfonso Cuarón’s pal James Cameron from calling it “the best space film ever done”. (2013)
American Sniper (TVNZ 2, 11.00pm). As long as anyone can remember, Hollywood has taken real-life stories and bent them like pretzels for the purpose of entertainment. The point at which this becomes intolerable is when it bumps up against something like the Iraq War. Bradley Cooper, who re-enacts the exploits of Navy Seal Chris Kyle, acclaimed as the most lethal sniper in US history, said that the film is apolitical. Director Clint Eastwood said that the film’s focus on the plight of one serviceman creates an anti-war message. This is the point at which one loses the will to live. (2014)
Last Vegas (Three, 11.15pm). A milder version of The Hangover for the older set. Retiree dream team Morgan Freeman, Michael Douglas, Robert De
Niro and Kevin Kline head to “the strip” to celebrate their single friend’s wedding and rekindle their old bonds. Things get nostalgic, but one expects more from a cast of this calibre. (2013)
SUNDAY DECEMBER 8
I, Tonya (TVNZ 2, 8.30pm).
“The figure skating scandal that shocked the world” is not something that would usually keep my attention. But the story of the world-class, redneck skater Tonya Harding whose boyfriend organised the assault of her main opponent before the 1994 Olympic team selection … well, that’s a different beast entirely. Director Craig Gillespie ( The Finest Hours) and writer Steven Rogers ( P.S. I Love You) play it a little fast and loose with the truth, but it’s not like this is the Iraq War here. They break movie conventions the way Harding broke skating conventions. Characters talk to the camera during scenes and sit down for mockumentary-style interviews. Stick around after the credits for the best bits: graceful footage of the real Harding on the ice, plus real interviews with the gormless goons behind the assault. (2017)
Like Father, Like Son (Māori TV, 8.30pm). A delicate and heartbreaking film about a wealthy young couple, Ryota and Midori (Masaharu Fukuyama and Machiko Ono), who discover that the child they have raised is not theirs. Due to a hospital mix-up, their family and another have a grave decision to make. Japanese writer-director Hirokazu Koreeda ( Shoplifters) has a talent for exploring the nature of parental and filial love, often with an element of class thrown in, and it is on full display here. (2013)
WEDNESDAY DECEMBER 11
Situation Hopeless … But Not Serious (Movies Vintage, Sky 035, 8.30pm). In one of Robert Redford’s first cinema outings, he plays an American flier who is forced to bail out over Nazi Germany with his co-pilot (Mike Connors). An eccentric German (Alec Guinness) hides them in his cellar, but fails to tell them that the war has ended. A light, amusing war comedy. (1965)
THURSDAY DECEMBER 12
Ága (Movies Extra, Sky 031, 8.30pm). Bulgarian director Milko Lazarov’s most recent art-house film tells the story of an isolated Inuit couple who hold on to their traditions in spite of modernity and the conspicuous absence of their daughter. It’s beautifully shot, but the stillness and slow pacing may test the patience of some. (2018)
FRIDAY DECEMBER 13
Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (TVNZ 2, 9.35pm). New Zealand makes an appearance in this 2015 instalment of the Mission: Impossible franchise, as the snowy backdrop to one of Tom Cruise’s highaction stunts, but, yet again, as the Listener’s Russell Baillie pointed out, the land of the long white cloud fails to get a namecheck. It’s “Kashmir” this time. According to director Christopher McQuarrie ( Mission: Impossible – Fallout, Jack Reacher), the country wasn’t politically complicated enough. Whatever. Rogue Nation runs a little long at two and a half hours, but it’s worth it for all that running, jumping, flying, chasing, falling and climbing. (2015)