25 Nov '11

“Instead of sulking and tantrums, we got polite engagement and some genuinely moving emotional connections. The teenagers glimpsed a life beyond the tyranny of cool and the tedium of self-indulgence, and they admired it. Contrived situation, yes, but the truth too.”
Tom Sutcliffe, The Independent

“Reversing the format didn’t quite turn the tables. In essence it still seems as if our modern way of living is pretty toxic compared to the simplicity of the Amish.”
Matt Baylis, Daily Express  

“Seventeen-year-old James – who is unemployed and doesn’t like fruit or vegetables – is set up as the hate figure until, in a manipulative twist that the producers ought to be ashamed of and works like a charm, his history of abandonment and foster care is revealed.”
Lucy Mangan, The Guardian

“Producers Keo Films are at the sharp end of the documentary scene at the moment, winning two Baftas last year (for Hugh’s Fish Fight and Welcome to Lagos), and it showed. Their cutest trick was having the teenagers’ Amish host Jonathan provide the voice-over, right from the start.”
Ed Cumming, The Telegraph

“I don’t understand the structure of these programmes. Here we have an hour spent on what should – especially once you’ve decided to ignore the one interesting angle, the pros and cons of perfect reproduction versus a broader sense of historical preservation – have taken five minutes.”
Lucy Mangan, The Guardian

“Because the programme itself was much concerned with the distinction between reproduction and the real thing, between authenticity and pastiche, it somehow got under my skin here. Why is it that so many stock devices of television storytelling are transparently bogus?”
Tom Sutcliffe, The Independent

“At one episode Life’s Too Short would have been too long.”
Andrew Billen, The Times