The Guardian 15 February, 2006
TV programs worth watching
Sun February 19 — Sat February 25
My viewing of the second episode of David Attenborough's fascinating Life In The
Undergrowth (ABC 7.30pm Sundays) was hampered by the resolute refusal of the
preview disc to continue past the half-way point.
Nevertheless, I can tell you that the early part of the episode, titled Taking In The
Air, uses the midsummer explosion of may flies over a river in Hungary to demonstrate
how the first insect wings evolved to enable their owners to mate and lay their eggs safe from the
water-borne predators that pursued them.
Meanwhile the process of metamorphosis, whereby caterpillars change into moths and butterflies
by using two separate sets of DNA, remains such a complex, clumsy process as must surely refute
any notion of an "intelligent designer".
The Mystery Of The Blue Train (ABC 8.30pm Sunday), the latest adaptation for
TV of an Agatha Christie mystery featuring her Belgian detective Hercule Poirot, is both stylish and
mystifying.
Guy Andrews' adaptation has the appropriate snobby attitudes and dubious morality of the upper
crust at play (it's mostly set on a train heading for the Rivierra). The script includes — besides
murder — theft, self-sacrifice, love, impersonation, hair-breadth escapes, blackmail.
I must say, however, that the mystery remains somewhat mystifying, leaving many loose
ends.
The attempt by the ABC last year to axe the children's current affairs program Behind The
News provoked a furious uproar. The program was saved, and returns this year in a new
timeslot (ABC 10.00am Tuesdays repeated 10.30am Wednesdays).
In addition, to satisfy demand for an after-school screening slot, the ABC is introducing
Behind The News Short Takes (ABC 4.50pm each weekday), a five-minute
program which will include in each instalment a story from the current week's episode of
Behind the News.
The original Grumpy Old Men and its stablemate Grumpy Old Women
were amusing because their subjects grouched about things that derived from growing old,
something we could all relate to.
Unfortunately, the TV stations thought its attraction was the grumpies themselves (and their
"outrageous" opinions). So it became a series — an empty and rather boring series, at
that.
Instead of actors, writers and politicians we now have mainly actors and television
"personalities".
The subject of Grumpy Old Men this week (ABC 8.00pm Tuesday) is "The
Meedja" , about which its subjects have little of real value to say.
I have not seen Saddam Hussein: America's Best Enemy screening in the
Cutting Edge timeslot (SBS 8.30pm Wednesday) so you know as much about it
as I do.
It traces the relationship between the US and Hussein's regime from his seizure of power in a
Ba'athist coup in 1968 to the present. We can probably get a clue to its approach by noting that it
relies heavily on the accounts of "leading figures in the American and Iraqi administrations and
intelligence services during this period".
Force Of Nature (ABC 8.00pm Thursdays) is a half-hour series of documentaries
about people battling the elements. Last week the owner of Virgin Airlines (together with a
professional balloon pilot) successfully flew a hot-air balloon across the Atlantic, only to totally stuff
up the landing and have to be rescued after all.
This week it's Survival In The Southern Ocean, the real life thriller of the 1996
Vendee Globe yacht race and the dramatic rescue by the Australian Navy of two contestants in
extreme conditions in the Southern Ocean somewhere between Australia and Antartica.
There have been two other documentaries (both better than this one) about this double rescue, but
it's still a modern maritime epic and worth watching if you've not seen the others.
Normally I abhor the kind of "reality" program where some hapless folk, hungry for television
"fame", agree to live like pioneers, or 18th century servants, or inmates of debtors' prison with no
likelihood of ever getting out. Unlike the real people they're imitating, they know they can get out so
they are spared the despair; or if they cut themselves they know they do not need to fear gangrene
and if they are "servants" they will not lose their position and have to sell themselves into
prostitution to survive.
So this week's new series Bomber Crew (ABC 8.30pm Thursdays), about five
young people training as a WW2 bomber crew, was refreshing: all five were grandchildren of men
who flew in Bomber Command, and the training was a chance to better understand what their
grandfathers had to do — except, as they point out themselves, there will not be anyone shooting at
them.
The account of their training and experiences are interspersed with accounts of the real thing by
veterans of Bomber Command. More than 55,000 Bomber Command aircrew never returned;
another 10,000 became prisoners of war.
I found the series well made and very watchable, thanks largely to the enthusiasm and good
humour of the four young men and one young woman taking part.
The ABC's drive to achieve the level of mediocrity of the commercial channels moves forward a
notch this week with the unveiling of the ABC's latest purchase: series four of The West
Wing.
A "drama series" set in the White House, with Martin Sheen as President Josiah Bartlet, the first
three series of The West Wing were screened on commercial TV here, before
being dropped (presumably for failing to rate).
More soap-opera than genuine drama, Aaron Sorkin's creation has carried off the Emmy Award for
best TV drama series four years in a row.
Series four begins with a "movie length" instalment entitled 20 Hours In America
(ABC 9.30pm Thursday).
Why is the television news in Romania so blood-thirsty? How has a family of evil characters
become the new TV heroes in Quebec? Has Russia's obsession with soap opera and light
entertainment evolved in response to difficult living conditions?
According to SBS, "these questions and more" are addressed in the new documentary series,
TV Around The World (SBS 8.00pm Fridays).
An Arte France and Point du Jour International production, it visits 22 countries, examining the role
of television in each country's cultural development and exploring the relationship between a
country's small-screen offerings and its society.
The series reveals great diversity in the viewing tastes of each country. Even in nations screening
the same programs — massive global franchises such as Big Brother — differences emerge
in the way they are watched and received.
In the second episode of Doc Martin (ABC 7.30pm Saturdays) the scriptwriter is
still trying to find the right touch for the mix of comedy and light drama that is clearly
intended.
Martin Clunes is OK as the new Doctor in town, but the script and the producers have still saddled
his character with a receptionist so arrogant, opinionated and inefficient that no one would put up
with her.
This week Doc Martin fires her, only to have the entire town turn against him — with no exceptions.
This unbelievable solidarity is typical of the show's weak writing.
Still, like the curate's egg, parts of it are OK, so in time they may get the whole of it
fixed.