Paradise, Disney+ review - enigmatic drama with an unknown destination

★★★ PARADISE, DISNEY+ Enigmatic drama with an unknown destination

Dan Fogelman's new series has an excellent cast but a recycled premise

The latest from the This Is Us creator, Dan Fogelman, is a futuristic take on relationships among survivors once Earth has suffered an extinction event, a popular concept in these troubled times. Except that it starts out by following an equally popular narrative track, the classic locked-door whodunit. Where is this heading?

Thank You, Goodnight: The Bon Jovi Story, Disney+ review - how the boy from Sayreville, NJ conquered the world

★★ THANK YOU, GOODNIGHT: THE BON JOVI STORY, DISNEY+ How the boy from Sayreville, NJ conquered the world

Four-part documentary series outstays its welcome

To mark the 40th anniversary of New Jersey’s second-greatest gift to rock’n’roll, Disney+ have served up this sprawling four-part documentary which tells you more about Jon Bon Jovi and his band of brothers than you ever needed to know. Or, possibly, wanted to.

Brawn: The Impossible Formula 1 Story, Disney+ review - classic underdog tale of the little team that could

Inside story of Jenson Button's amazing championship year

When they read the roll-call of British Formula One champions, the likes of Jackie Stewart, Graham and Damon Hill and Nigel Mansell tend to grab the spotlight, but Jenson Button’s dramatic and totally unexpected win in 2009 is every bit as worthy of celebration. It get its due here, in Disney’s hugely entertaining account of how Button, team boss Ross Brawn and his unfancied and underfunded squad defied the odds and provoked apoplexy among the F1 aristocracy.

Only Murders in the Building, Disney+ review - this comedy crime drama is a class act

★★★★★ ONLY MURDERS IN THE BUILDING, DISNEY+ Comedy crime drama is a class act

Guest star Meryl Streep is the icing on the cake

Despite its cursory nods to new technology, there’s something deliciously old-fashioned about Only Murders in the Building. Now into its third series, it tells the stories of a trio of affluent Manhattanites who make true-life podcasts about the mysterious deaths that occur in their palatial Upper West Side apartment building.

A different angle on the Anne Frank story in 'A Small Light'

A SMALL LIGHT A different angle on the Anne Frank story in a Disney drama

Bel Powley, Liev Schreiber and Joe Cole star in Disney's new eight-part drama

The Diary of Anne Frank became a Broadway play and has formed the basis of a lengthy catalogue of films and TV series, but the name of Miep Gies is rather less well-known. Yet without Gies the Anne Frank story might never have reached the wider world, since it was she who helped the Frank family, along with four other Dutch Jews, to remain in hiding and evade capture by the Germans from July 1942 until their luck ran out in August 1944.

Fleishman Is in Trouble, Disney+ review - mid-life crises in Manhattan

★★★★ FLEISHMAN IS IN TROUBLE, DISNEY+ Mid-life crises in Manhattan 

Taffy Brodesser-Akner adapts her hit novel about high-flyers losing their bearings

As films and television series based in New York City tend to do, Fleishman Is in Trouble opens with an aerial shot of Manhattan – except, significantly, this sequence is presented upside down. To the celestial sound of tinkling arpeggios, the slim skyscrapers of the Upper East Side hang down from the sky into a blue cloudless ocean like futuristic stalactites, the camera moving gently through them before dipping, Psycho-style, through a window. 

'We needed to find the perfect sound of vibranium, an alien metal specific to the Marvel Universe': Foley artist Shelley Roden on creating audible movie miracles

The fine art of naturalising sound on 'Black Panther: Wakanda Forever'

The projection screen reflects light onto the Foley stage. I can just make out the edges of the built-in cement and metal surfaces around the floor’s perimeter and the large dirt pit centre stage. Bamboo poles, a hockey stick, and a shovel poke out from storage bins to my right. The corner of a car hood winks from underneath a furniture blanket. These tools wait their turn to become something other than what they were originally designed for. 

Frozen, Theatre Royal Drury Lane review - twinkling spectacle with a sincere drama at its heart

★★★★ FROZEN, THEATRE ROYAL DRURY LANE The stage version of the beloved animation looks set to become a West End staple

The stage version of the beloved animation looks set to become a West End staple

Let it snow! The Broadway musical adaptation of the Disney film behemoth Frozen premiered back in 2018 and now, following Covid delays, a rejigged version finally makes its home in the West End – to the delight of the army of miniature Elsas in attendance.