TV Critics: The Police Commissioner; My Granny The Escort; The Seduction of Smoking

“While they still are getting made…the mockumentaries – Twenty Twelve and W1A etc – are pretty much redundant. Because this is so much better.”
Sam Wollaston, The Guardian

“This warts-and-all film, which portrays Barnes as plucky but gaffe-prone, and which frequently feels more like a Twenty Twelve-style spoof than reality, is unlikely to help her cause.”
Michael Hogan, The Telegraph

“The opening scenes of last night’s Meet The Police Commissioner (Channel 4), a fly-on-the-wall documentary about Kent police’s inaugural elected chief, were a masterclass in mischievous editing.”
Ceri Radford, The Telegraph

“Film-maker Miles Blayden-Ryall wisely realised his job was not to interfere by asking questions or steering the narrative; he simply pointed the camera and paid out the rope as Ann tied herself in knots.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail

“Instead of fully exploring these possibilities, Russell was content to follow his subjects around, asking faux-naif questions, like a Harold in search of his Maude.”
Ellen E Jones, The Independent

“Film-maker Charlie Russell’s portryal of Britain’s mature escorts is both frank and intimate.”
Rebecca Smith, The Telegraph

“Sordid voyeurism? Maybe, but the programme also offered a sensitive and nuanced perspective which broke down the familiar narratives of powerless women and predatory men.”
Ceri Radford, The Telegraph

“Taylor’s depiction of this Manichaean war between (evil) Big Tobacco and (good) anti-smoking campaigners was compelling, but there was one interested party that doesn’t quite fit his schema; the smokers themselves….[It] didn’t fully explain how cigarettes continue to seduce so many. Despite – or perhaps because of – his immersion all things tobacco, Taylor seemed at a loss to explain it.”
Ellen E Jones, The Independent

“Burning Desire (BBC2) was not a documentary but a polemic…Unashamed bias might seem acceptable in this case, but it’s hard to imagine the BBC sanctioning such a one-sided programme about other proven carcinogens — eating red meat, for example, or driving diesels.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail