Thursday’s TV tips
New series. Wildlife documentary venturing below the waves to examine the ocean predators’ behaviour.
The first film reveals their many different hunting methods, from blacktip sharks gathering in huge packs and herding fish into baitballs, to tasselled wobbegongs, which ambush their prey.
Other highlights include Greenland sharks, which live under the arctic ice, whitetip reef sharks - arguably the masters of night-time hunting – and the great white, shown stalking fur seals off the coast of South Africa. Followed by a short behind-the-scenes film revealing how the episode was made.
From chest pains to cardiac arrest, in episode 4 we see how a fast reaction to a heart attack, can be a matter of life or death.
As ambulance crews face the reality of drug abuse in Ireland, Paramedics Peter and Imelda are yet again faced with back to back drug overdoses.
And what happens when an emergency is not about bandages and medicine? How Paramedics and emergency call takers cope, when faced with mental health related calls.
This year Darren and Jennifer meet 22 year old eternal student Nicole from Carlow and 26 year old Issa, a would-be addiction counsellor from Kenya.
Despite completing a range of college courses, Nicole has had no luck when it comes to finding a job and is reaching the end of her tether. Meanwhile Issa, who arrived in Ireland from Kenya five years ago cannot secure a job in his field of expertise – addiction counselling.
Both of them feel the weight of their families’ expectations for them and are desperate to find employment.
At our job seeking bootcamp, Issa learns to get some fire in his belly when it comes to selling himself while Nicole learns to focus on one objective rather than adopting a scatter-gun approach to jobseeking.
The Cold War drama continues with another gripping episode in which Steven Mackintosh appears as Tom Mallory.
To all intents and purposes, he’s a reliable and well-liked member of the Ministry of Defence staff, but he’s also a KGB sleeper agent whose ability to lay his hands on top secret documents has proved valuable to his Soviet employers.
Another hush-hush document is about to fall onto his desk, one which, if he leaks its contents, could leave the UK open to a nuclear attack _ but will Mallory really betray his country?
Daddy can’t take the risk, and uses all the resources he can to find him and remind him where his priorities should lay. Meanwhile, ghosts from Joe’s past threaten his effectiveness as an agent.
(2008) Themes of certainty and suspicion underpin writer/director John Patrick Shanley’s film, adapted of his own Tony award-winning stage play of the same name, set in a ’60s Catholic school.
On the basis of rumour and hearsay, Father Flynn (Philip Semour Hoffman) is accused of child abuse. The ferocious Sister Aloysius (Meryl Streep) makes it her mission to bully Flynn into a confession of guilt.
Doubt lacks the immediacy and some of the palpable tension of the stage version but Shanley’s adaptation of his own source material is still a riveting game of cat and mouse. Amy Adams and a scene-stealing Viola Davis also star.
Lusitania: an ocean liner to rival Titanic. On May 7th 1915 11 miles off the Old Head of Kinsale she was struck by a single torpedo from a German U-boat.
18 minutes later she was gone: a death toll of nearly 1200.
Who will live and who will die, as the political shockwave is felt around the world?
(2005) A struggling shoe factory boss decides to go against tradition and cater for more unusual tastes. His inspiration arrives in the shape of a Soho cabaret singer, who comes up with a plan for the business to manufacture specialist footwear for drag artists.
However, first they have to win over the stunned workforce and prove their worth at a high-profile fashion show.
Chiwetel Ejiofor gives a knockout performance as the central protagonist, and there’s a great soundtrack too.
The film was ably directed by Julian Jarrold, who went on to make the big screen version of Brideshead Revisited, and an episode of the acclaimed Red Riding saga. Joel Edgerton, Linda Bassett and Nick Frost co-star.
