Week 45 highlights 2012

24 October 2012

Secret State

 

The best programmes on Channel 4 from Saturday 3rd to Friday 9th November.

 

Saturday 03/11/2012
9pm
Green Zone
Network premiere of the 2010 thriller starring Matt Damon and Greg Kinnear. Director Paul Greengrass (The Bourne Ultimatum) fuses his attraction to real-life events with full-pelt action to offer this commentary on the Iraq War. US Army officer Roy Miller (Damon) is thrown into the chaotic vacuum created by Saddam Hussein's removal and the Allies' handling of the aftermath. His mission: to track down those elusive weapons of mass destruction. But as he digs deeper, Miller begins to piece together the complex relationships and competing ideologies of those around him, as well as the possibility that he has also stumbled upon a political conspiracy...

 

Sunday, 04/11/2012
9pm
Homeland 5/12: Q&A
The second series of the Emmy Award-winning, dark, compelling US thriller starring Damian Lewis and Claire Danes. Brody finds himself a prisoner again, but this time on American soil. Carrie is forced to play second fiddle after her rash judgement call at the hotel, while Estes is kept busy making sure that Jessica stays off their trail. Meanwhile, Dana's relationship with Finn is taken to the next level, changing from fun to deadly serious.

 

Monday, 05/11/2012
8pm
Nuclear War Games: Channel 4 Dispatches
On the eve of the US presidential election Dispatches explores one of the major international issues facing the world: the possibility of an Israeli attack on Iran's nuclear facilities. The programme has gained exclusive access to an Israeli 'war game', in which an Israeli attack on Iran is played out in detail. The outcome of the imagined scenario could help Israel decide whether it goes to war with Iran. Dispatches examines how such a conflict could have dire repercussions for global stability and goes inside a country that lives with the permanent threat of war.

 

Tuesday 06/11/2012
9pm
Heston's Fantastical Food 1/7: Heston's Big Breakfast
In this brand new series, culinary alchemist Heston Blumenthal brings back the wonder and excitement of childhood food memories and flavours on a monumental scale, awakening the kid in every viewer. Heston combines his exacting scientific expertise and culinary genius to recreate and supersize some fantastical treats, and also breaks food records along the way. In this first episode, Heston's Big Breakfast, Heston tackles breakfast, the often neglected most important meal of the day, using all his scientific and culinary resources to create the world's largest boiled egg, and cereal on an epic scale.

 

Wednesday 07/11/2012
8pm
The Great British Property Scandal: Every Empty Counts
Almost a year after launching his campaign to get some of Britain's 350,000 long term empty homes back into use for families in need, George Clarke reports on the remarkable progress that's been made. It certainly worked - governments in England, Scotland and Wales now have funds totalling £17m. And George's campaign was so successful that the government appointed him Independent Empty Homes Advisor. The new film features some of the 6500 people who reported an empty in their local area, but also discovers that the government is still allowing councils to demolish thousands of perfectly decent empty homes.

 

Wednesday 07/11/2012
10pm
Secret State 1/4
Gabriel Byrne, Douglas Hodge, Gina McKee, Charles Dance, Rupert Graves and Ruth Negga star in the four-part political drama written by Robert Jones (Lennon Naked) and directed by Ed Fraiman (The Philanthropist), which is inspired by Chris Mullin's novel A Very British Coup. Deputy Prime Minister Tom Dawkins (Byrne) vows to take on the American petrochemical company Petrofex after a devastating accident on British soil. Following the suspicious death of the Prime Minister in a plane crash, Dawkins' understated political ambitions are tested as heavyweights Ros Yelland (Sylvestra La Touzel) and Felix Durrell (Graves) vie for the top job, but neither appears to have justice for the victims at the forefront of their campaign.

A press pack is available at http://www.channel4.com/info/press/press-packs/secret-state-press-pack

 

 

Thursday, 08/11/2012
8pm
Kirstie's Vintage Home 1/6
In this new series, Kirstie Allsopp looks to the past for inspiration, embracing vintage style to help homeowners desperately in need of help. She transforms unloved and cluttered houses into beautiful homely homes. In the first episode Kirstie comes to the aid of Colin Webster and Amber Moss whose 1960s maisonette near Edinburgh's 'secret beach' is drowning in oceans of clutter as the pair juggle a new baby, busy lives and a tendency towards panic buying online bargains. Kirstie helps them craft their way from desperate mess to des res.

 

Thursday, 08/11/2012
9pm
The Inbetweeners Movie
Network premiere of the 2011 film from series creators Iain Morris and Damon Beesley, and director Ben Palmer. The Film4 production was a massive hit, claiming the biggest box office take for a comedy that the UK has ever seen. The show's stars Simon Bird (Will), Joe Thomas (Simon), Blake Harrison (Neil) and James Buckley (Jay) are all present, though definitely not correct. The lads have now finished sixth form and have decided to celebrate with a holiday in Malia on the island of Crete, naturally seeing this as the perfect opportunity to grab as much sun, sea and sex as possible...

 

Friday, 09/11/2012
9pm
Derren Brown: 1/2: Fear and Faith
BAFTA winning Derren Brown continues his specials for 2012 with his customary inventive, intelligent mix of thought-provoking, compelling entertainment, stunts and suggestion, combined with tried and tested psychological tricks and experiments. The first of a two-part event, Fear and Faith is an extraordinary film looking at what happens when people have the experience of fear removed through the use of a powerful new drug.