Daily Mail - Daily Mail Weekend Magazine
Films of the week
VICTORIA & ABDUL
(2017) PG ● Saturday, 9.15pm, BBC2 ★★★★ The aged Queen Victoria in this buoyant drama (played with customary poise by Judi Dench) is bored, lethargic and prone to falling asleep mid-banquet.
But the twinkle in her eye returns when she meets Indian Muslim Abdul Karim (Ali Fazal, above, with Dench). Appointing him her servant and later her Munshi, or teacher, she develops a close platonic friendship with Abdul that causes great unease, but is hugely beneficial to the monarch. Abdul Karim was a real figure in the royal household, but after the Queen’s death, his existence was all but erased. Stephen Frears’s film is funny and heart-warming, with noteworthy support from Michael Gambon, Adeel Akhtar, and Eddie Izzard as Bertie, the Prince of Wales.
THE TEN COMMANDMENTS
(1956) U ● Easter Sunday, 1.40pm, Ch5 ★★★★★
Biblical epics don’t get more epic than this. At the time of its release, Cecil B. Demille’s film was heaped with praise, with one critic describing it as ‘the summit of screen achievement’. And it is at the summit of Mount Sinai that Moses (Charlton Heston, above) hears the voice of God and sets out to free the Hebrews. Before he heeds his calling, Prince Moses – the baby in the bulrushes adopted into the Egyptian royal household – rises through the ranks and becomes a successful general. He feels, however, a deep compassion for the Hebrew people, eventually learning that he is Hebrew by birth. The thrilling, almighty quest of Moses – from devastating plagues to the parting of the Red Sea – is a spectacular sight to behold.