MIKE WARD’S SMALL SCREEN
A STAR IS BORN (15)
(Download now, DVD and Blu-ray from Monday)
WELL and truly standing the test of time, this story dates back more than 80 years.
Not this version, obviously. This is the third remake of a film that came out before World War Two, in this case charting the relationship between Bradley Cooper’s Jackson, a seasoned country music star with a serious booze and drugs problem, and Lady Gaga’s Ally, an extraordinarily gifted singersongwriter who’s lost faith in the music business and abandoned hope of achieving her dreams.
Cooper (who also directs) is in tremendous form as a selfdestructive soul who enables this remarkable woman to rediscover her self-belief and find the audience she’s always deserved, but who begins to feel increasingly conflicted as her career takes a very different path from his own.
NEW AMSTERDAM
(Amazon Prime Video)
THIS US medical drama, launching on Amazon today, stars Ryan Eggold as Dr Max Goodwin, taking on the role of chief of medicine at a famous public hospital in New York.
Founded on fine principles, the New Amsterdam is seriously underfunded these days and desperately short of staff, but new arrival Max is determined to shake the place up, restore its reputation and return it to its former glory – even if that means ruffling quite a few feathers.
Ex-Doctor Who star Freema Agyeman plays head of oncology Dr Helen Sharpe, one of the first major figures he finds himself on a collision course with. THE GENTLEMAN DRIVER
(Netflix)
Gentlemen drivers are the fabulously wealthy amateurs who pump in a small fortune and get to race alongside the full-time pros at major endurance sports car events. This new documentary follows four of them throughout the 2015-16 season, competing on some of the world’s most famous circuits.
THE EXPANSE
(Amazon Prime Video)
Available to stream from today are the first three seasons of this US sci-fi adventure, set in a distant future where the human race has spread itself throughout the solar system and the fight for resources has put planets on the brink of war. Season four will be launching as a Prime Original later in the year. ®