Tag Archives: Toby Jones

The Long Shadow. Television Drama Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision

Cast: David Morrissey, Lee Ingleby, Toby Jones, Liz White, Michael McElhatton, Jack Deam, Toby Jones, Chloe Harris, Steven Waddington, Jasmine Lee-Jones, Kris Hitchin, Stephen Tompkinson, Liam Garrigan, Christopher Hatherall, John Henshaw, Victoria Myers, Shaun Thomas, Charley Webb, James Clay, Emma Cunniffe, Adam Long, Kate Rutter, Dorothy Atkinson, Sorcha Groundsell, Jill Halfpenny, Marcus Fraser, Daniel Mays, Charlotte Tyree, Paul Brennen, Colin R. Campbell, Alexa Davies, Emma Williams, Nicola Stephenson, Robert James-Collier, Daisy Waterstone, Mark Stobbart, Sammy Winward, Katherine Kelly, Nigel Betts.

The Long Shadow. Television Drama Review. full post

(630 words, estimated 2:31 mins reading time)

The English. Television Series Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Chaske Spencer, Emily Blunt, Tom Hughes, Steve Wall, Stephen Rae, Valerie Pachner, Malcolm Storry, Nicholas Aaron, Ciarán Hinds,  Ian Pirie, Toby Jones, Miguel Alvarez, William Belleau, Walt Klink, Cristian Solimeno, Tadhg Murphy, Rafe Spall, Julian Bleach, Jan Knightley, Rod Rondeaux, Corey Bird, Sam Alexander, Tonantzin Carmelo, Nichola McAuliffe, Andy Williams, Kristian Phillips, Ben Temple, Gary Farmer, Arturo Vazquez, Matilda Ziobrowski, Jimmy Shaw, Benjamin Victor, Edward Crook, Kimberly Guerrero, Stuart Milligan.

The English. Television Series Review. full post

(597 words, estimated 2:23 mins reading time)

Uncle Vanya. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Roger Allam, Richard Armitage, Anna Calder-Marshall, Rosalind Eleazer, Toby Jones, Dearbhla Molloy, Aimee Lou Wood, Peter Wright.

The annoyance of life is such that it only takes one diversion in the perceived day to day normality to throw us from the gentle walk to oblivion and into the realm of unfettered chaos.

Uncle Vanya. Television Review. full post

(608 words, estimated 2:26 mins reading time)

The Birthday Party. Radio Play Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * * *

Cast: Toby Jones, Henry Goodman, Stephen Rae, Maggie Steed, Peter Wright, Jamie Winstone.

Harold Pinter’s first major play, The Birthday Party, has either captivated or underwhelmed audiences since it first came to the stage sixty years ago. Even in 2018 as it was revived with Zoe Wanamaker, Stephen Mangan and Pearl Mackie amongst its cast, it left confusion in its wake, taken to heart by many, but leaving some distrusting of the playwright’s ultimate question which never truly gets spoken out loud.

The Birthday Party. Radio Play Review. full post

(455 words, estimated 1:49 mins reading time)

Christopher Robin. Film Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Ewan McGregor, Hayley Atwell, Bronte Carmichael, Mark Gatiss, Oliver Ford Davies, Ronke Adekoluejo, Adrian Scarborough, Roger Ashton-Griffiths, Ken Nwosu, John Dagleish, Amanda Lawrence, Katy Carmichael, Orton O’ Brien, Tristan Sturrock, Jasmine-Simone Charles, Paul Chahidi, Simon Farnaby, Mackenzie Crook, Jim Cummings, Brad Garrett, Nick Mohammed, Peter Capaldi, Sophie Okonedo, Sara Sheen, Toby Jones.

It is, with hindsight, easy to suggest that humanity in the 20th Century lost its way, that we as a collected species lost our wonder and our innocence to a new way of thinking, a rational that arguably had its genesis in the self-imposed, stiff upper lipped facade philosophy created by the Victorians and to which even now has eaten away at our ability to forget the dreams we had as children and the wondrous stories we could weave.

Christopher Robin. Film Review. full post

(556 words, estimated 2:13 mins reading time)

Journey’s End, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Asa Butterfield, Sam Clafin, Paul Bettany, Tom Sturridge, Toby Jones, Stephen Graham, Robert Glenister, Nicholas Agnew, Miles Jupp, Theo Barklam-Biggs, Jake Curran, Andy Gathergood, Rupert Wickham, Jack Holden, Tom Ward-Thomas, Derek Barr, Jack Riddiford, Elliot Balchin, Alais Lawson, Adam Colborne, Rose Read, Harry Jardine.

It is not the battle itself, the moment when it all ends and the tears shed, it is the reassurance of existence, even in the most inhospitable of places, of the dirt, the mud and the endless torture of waiting for an attack, it is in the moments before, the quiet and the damned making themselves known and invading the final private thoughts of those who understand that the battle, but not the war, is lost

Journey’s End, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool. full post

(571 words, estimated 2:17 mins reading time)

The Snowman. Film Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision * *

Cast: Michael Fassbender, Rebecca Ferguson, Chloe Sevigny, Val Kilmer, J.K. Simmons, Charlotte Gainbourg, Jamie Clayton, James D’Arcy, David Dencik, Toby Jones, Sofia Helin, Jacob Oftebro, Anna Reid, Jonas Karlsson.

It could be deemed our own fault, the height of expectation drawn from the Nordic Noir television and film dramas has been of such good quality, that as an audience we perhaps think that any drama set in the north of Europe is going to reap the same beneficial advantages of story-telling, that the quality bench mark cannot falter. An expectation sadly not realised when it comes to The Snowman.

The Snowman. Film Review. full post

(410 words, estimated 1:38 mins reading time)

Atomic Blonde, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 8.5/10

Cast: Charlize Theron, James McAvoy, Eddie Marsan, John Goodman, Toby Jones, James Faulkner, Roland Møller , Sofia Boutella, Bill Skarsgård , Sam Hargrave, Johannes, Jóhannes Haukur Jóhannesson , Til Scheiger, Barbara Sokowa.

It could be construed as Spy versus Spy but without the humour or anarchic level of higher learning and yet Atomic Blonde takes on the genre with surprisingly good value and with a storyline that is surrounded by one of the great moments in European history; the Berlin had stood as a symbol of the Cold War for 28 years but as the heat exchanged between Charlize Theron and all who stood in her built up, Atomic Blonde is nothing but explosive from start to the inevitable fall out.

Atomic Blonde, Film Review. Picturehouse@F.A.C.T., Liverpool. full post

(527 words, estimated 2:06 mins reading time)

Sherlock Holmes: The Lying Detective. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Cast: Benedict Cumberbatch, Martin Freeman, Una Stubbs, Rupert Graves, Mark Gatiss, Amanda Abbington, Louise Brealey, Toby Jones, Lindsay Duncan, Sian Brooke, Asheq Akhtar, Usman Akram, Sharon Cherry Ballard, Miranda Hennessy, Lee Kemp, David Kirkbride, Tom Williams, Chris Wilson.

The rich and powerful can always be counted upon to act how they like, that in cases of responsibility, of holding back and restraint of acts of cruelty, they believe they are untouchable, above the law, both physically and morally; it is how corruption breeds, how money will always look after money and in the end how everybody lies just to keep in line, to toe the official version.

Sherlock Holmes: The Lying Detective. Television Review. full post

(416 words, estimated 1:40 mins reading time)

Witness For The Prosecution. Television Review.

Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * *

Cast: Toby Jones, Andrea Riseborough, Billy Howle, Hayley Carmichael, Monica Dolan, Kim Cattrall, David Haig, Miranda Nolan, Charles De’Ath, Dorian Lough, Paul Ready, Tim McMullan, Robert East, Adam Jowett, Andrew Havill, Ted Robins, Reid Anderson, William Atkinson, Grant Crookes, Carla Langley, Paul Dallison, Keith Lomas, Charlotte Mason-Apps, Dennis O’ Donnell, Graham Partington, Nicola-Jayne Wells, Patricia Winker.

Agatha Christie is such a staple of television and film that sometimes it can be hard to overlook or forgive when an adaptation has not quite hit the high marks expected of it, sometimes you have let it wash over you and remember the good times, when a marvellous suspense mystery would have the viewer glowing with anticipation and the television schedules would be moved accordingly.

Witness For The Prosecution. Television Review. full post

(445 words, estimated 1:47 mins reading time)