As part of Britain’s Forgotten Children season on Channel 4, this moving documentary charted journalist Rachel Roberts’ attempts to trace some of the children with whom she was in a care home in Doncaster. She also wanted to find the matron of the home, Tina – of whom she had nothing but fond memories – and her husband Dennis. This particular sentiment was one that we were to discover was shared by all those she met who’d also been in Tina and Dennis’s care.

Rachel, who’s now 38, was just four years old when she and her sister Jenny were placed into the care of social services and – unlike many of the people we’ve encountered in this emotive series of documentaries – described her time in care “a positive experience” adding, “I was really happy there.” Read more & comment »

This was a very emotive film, as of course all media reports about missing children are and especially this high profile case, but the McCann’s have had to face so much, I wonder how they’re still standing; how they’re still functioning and able to live with what any parent will know must be the horrific thoughts about what could have happened to their daughter.

I can think of few things worse than having your child abducted, except perhaps not knowing what happened to her and if she’s dead or alive.

As we all know, on May 3rd 2007, their daughter Madeleine was abducted from their holiday apartment in the Portugese resort of Praia da Luz and she’s never been seen again. This Cutting Edge documentary examined the circumstances of her disappearance as well as catching up with how Kate and Gerry McCann have been coping with everything that’s happened to them since that fateful and devastating night… Read more & comment »

I did much of my growing up in the 70s and even though this show is set in America and I was brought up in rural Cheshire, I love to watch it for many reasons but one being all the retro stuff that brings back some great childhood memories…

The big collars, the bizarre hair, the TV shows, the gaudy furniture and wall coverings but best of all – apart from the fact that it’s exceptionally funny – is the music. The seventies were without question the best musical decade in my opinion and lots of classic rock crops up on That ‘70s Show.

In case you’ve never seen it, here’s what it’s all about… Read more & comment »

This was awful. I don’t often begin my reviews with such negativity, but truly, as much as I love Martin Clunes in every other role he’s ever had, as Reggie Perrin, I’m afraid I feel he was grave robbing…

Well, maybe not him per se but certainly the commissioning editors at the BBC as well as Simon Nye and David Nobbs – who wrote the adaptation – certainly are; and actually, David Nobbs wrote the original Reggie Perrin series’, so what he was thinking, I can’t imagine!

I guess if you’ve never seen the original, then a) you won’t really get what’s going on and b) you might feel differently, but to remake Reggie was, in my opinion anyway, a big mistake; there can be only one Reggie Perrin and that’s the late, great Leonard Rossiter…

Read more & comment »

To be honest, ten years ago when Daisy Asquith made the first documentary about a 15 year old living in Brixton called Kimberley – which won Asquith a BAFTA – I don’t suppose it occurred to anyone – other than Asquith – that perhaps there would be a follow up film ten years on. But, if it’d been announced at the time, I’d have put about a million pounds on it that when ten years had gone by, Kimberley would’ve had several more children, by several different fathers and would be an overweight eater of junk food, living on benefits and a committed daytime TV watcher; in other words, someone Jeremy Kyle might have on his show. Either that or an underweight junkie who’d had several kids taken into care.

I would only have been in part right… Ten years ago, Kimberley was a ‘typical’ Brixton teenager; loud, opinionated, and usually with the wrong or ill-informed ones, from a broken home and worse yet, she’d been the victim of a rape at just 12 years old. She was relatively unintelligent academically but she was streetwise and at that time, despite being what I would consider gobby, stroppy and a girl with a pretty bleak future, she expressed a determination not to end up pregnant young like her mother and sister had done, but quelle surpise, that’s exactly what happened… Read more & comment »

In last night’s edition of Horizon, David Baddiel, comedian, presenter and father of two, set out to answer one of the – arguably – biggest questions a parent can ask; how best to educate your child… so I’m not sure why they didn’t title the programme along those lines rather than “Who Do You Want Your Child To Be?” which would’ve suggested to me – had I not read the ‘blurb’ – that the programme was probably something to do with genetic selection and fiddling about at embryonic stage, however, I digress…

Taking in the latest scientific research, David uncovered some unconventional approaches to this issue; from the parent ‘hot-hosing’ his child to record-breaking feats of maths, to a school that pays cash for good grades.

David witnessed a “ground-breaking experiment” that suggested a child’s destiny can be predicted at the age of four, and we heard how three little words “can ruin a child’s chance of success for good” and those words are, “You’re so clever”. Read more & comment »

In last night’s disturbing documentary from Dispatches, the deservedly award-winning Pakistani journalist Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy investigated how the “war on terror” is creating a generation of child terrorists in her homeland Pakistan. These children are prepared to kill others and themselves, both inside and outside Pakistan.

Sharmeen investigated how the Taliban are recruiting increasingly younger and younger “fighters” to serve their need for what amounts to cannon fodder and expendable ’soldiers’.

She met with a 14-year-old boy in her home city of Karachi who is desperate to become a suicide bomber. Sharmeen then followed the elite unit of the anti-terror police squad who warn that the Taliban are hiding out in the city’s sprawling slums and recruiting children from small deprived neighbourhoods.

Sharmeen also interviewed a Taliban commander who’s responsible for child recruitment, and he happily revealed that children as young as five are now being used by the Taliban. Read more & comment »

Last night’s, ‘Deborah 13: Servant of God’ was a very strange and disturbing film about a “devout evangelical teenager” which began with a commentary that revealed just how ’sheltered’ Deborah and her siblings are from the world.

For instance, Deborah had no clue who Victoria Beckham was and she very courteously asked what Britney’s surname was…

And what began as a nice chat with this innocent and uber-sheltered teenager soon became a very freaky exchange of ‘words’ with the director of the film who she accused of being, “a lying, thieving blasphemer” who was undoubtedly damned to an eternity in hell. Yikes…. Read more & comment »

Well it’s difficult to know how to best describe this episode of Red Riding – which was the first if Channel 4’s three, two-hour long adaptations from the novels of David Peace – in words other than brilliant, perfect and awe-inspiring.

It is truly rare that a drama of this quality comes along, and when those of us who are paid to be TV critics cannot criticise even a minor pedantic detail – or at least, this one can’t anyway – it’s a rare day… Red Riding: 1974, was simply faultless.

Mind you, with a cast that boasted Andrew Garfield – in his first role on Channel 4 since his Bafta-winning performance in ‘Boy A’ – and other cast members of an equally celebrated and deservedly A list stature, it would’ve taken some seriously poor direction and/or writing to make it anything less than amazing, and praise be, neither applied… Read more & comment »

Why oh why does anyone actually like or watch this show? Me? I can’t stand it. Why? Because it’s been on since God was a lad and they may as well have recorded just one show that they then did the graphics/telly magic equivalent of photoshopping on other faces… in other words, it barely changes – nothing new happens except there are different contestants. Mind you, I think some of the contestants have in fact been there waiting their turn since time began.

Indeed, some of them, I suspect, have in fact fossilised.

The lady in the clip that follows, Mary, was probably about 12 when she first joined the panel of hopefuls, but the really funny bit about her time on in the ‘crazy chair’ as Noel calls it, was that the poor old dear – and she is a very sweet lady – had no clue that she’d won for a few seconds and I have to admit, loathe though I am to admit it, it brought a tear to my eye when she realised what amount she’d won… Click on the Read More link to see the clip… Read more & comment »

As TV viewers, we’ve got more choices and options than at any time in the history of TV watching, but nonetheless, there are still TV things that are thrust upon us whether we want them or not; a bit like fairy cakes when you go to your mother in law’s.

So what we want to know is, if you were appointed fairy godmother or godfather – see, we’re politically correct here at Primetime – and were given a magic TV wand to wave, what five things would you banish from TV land?

Here’s what I’d wave my magic telly wand at and make disappear into a cloud of pixellated dust… Read more & comment »

Last night’s premiere of season two of Mad Men on BBC4 was one of the best shows I’ve seen of late and I’m now just really hoping I can catch up with season one online somewhere! So if, like me, you’ve never seen it before, it’s basically an American drama series that’s set on Madison Avenue in New York during the late 1950s and early 60s.

There’s intrigue, back stabbing, false identities and complex men and women with one thing in common; their lives are changing as America enters a new era and some cope well with that while others are sinking.

The plot centres around the Sterling Cooper advertising agency and one of its partners, Don Draper, played by Jon Hamm. He’s a high-flying advertising exec, and we follow his life including the people who matter most to him and the clients who’re in and out of the office… Read more & comment »

This week’s TV has been a positive cornucopia of dubious televisual delights, not least, the hideous spectacle of Verne Troyer snogging a doll. I literally gagged as he ‘French kissed’ and fondled the breasts of the doll while pretending it was Mutya.

It was truly hideous and sparked outrage from viewers who were similarly repulsed, however, as repellent as it was, one thing seems to have been kinda missed… if it had been Coolio or Terry or Tommy who’d done it, it would have had serious paedophilic overtones but because it was done by someone who was ‘small’ – but nonetheless an adult man – it was just gross.

I’ve been trying to figure it out and that is the only thing I can think of for why there weren’t cries of ‘paedo’ ringing around TV forums; simply because Verne is child sized. How weird is that??

I’ll remember the day always because it was the same day that Ulrika didn’t cry and DFS weren’t having a sale. Read more & comment »

Last week’s telly turned up some awesome shows and acting and equally, some pretty abysmal stuff, so let’s take a look at my picks of the the good, the bad and the ugly of last week’s telly…

The Good

I really enjoyed watching In Bed With Yvette & Karl last night which was followed by Most Haunted: Top 25 Moments.

While we were metaphorically in bed with Yvette and Karl, we heard that this mystery operation that Yvette had was a partial hysterectomy which begged the question, why was there a big shroud of secrecy over it? I really can’t imagine. Yes, of course it’s always scary when anyone needs an op but given the hype and mystery about it, I was expecting something really serious… Read more & comment »