11/02/2012

Synopsis

Tom Sutcliffe and his guests novelist Dreda Say Mitchell, historian Kathryn Hughes and theatre writer David Benedict review the week's cultural highlights.

A Dangerous Method is David Cronenberg's film which centres around the relationship between Carl Jung (Michael Fassbender) and Sigmund Freud (Viggo Mortensen) when psychoanalysis was in its infancy in the early 20th century. Keira Knightley plays Sabina Spielrein - a young woman who Jung initially took on as a patient but who went on to play a pivotal role in the development of the science.

Solomon Kugel - hero of Shalom Auslander's debut novel Hope: A Tragedy - is surprised to find someone living in the attic of the farmhouse that he and his family have moved into. He is even more surprised when the old woman in question claims to be Anne Frank.

Susan Hill's classic ghost story The Woman in Black has now been adapted for the screen by Jane Goldman with James Watkins in the director's chair. Daniel Radcliffe stars as Arthur Kipps, a young lawyer grieving for his wife who died in childbirth. He is sent to a remote village to settle the affairs of an elderly widow who has recently died. The villagers try to dissuade him from visiting the mansion where she used to live and he soon finds out why.

Lucian Freud Portraits at the National Portrait Gallery in London features work by the artist from the 1940s through to the painting that he was working on at the time of his death last year. It is the first time that a major exhibition of his portraits has been put together.

Homeland is a new television drama by the creators of 24. Damien Lewis stars as Marine Sergeant Nicholas Brody who has been missing in Iraq for eight years but is discovered when special forces attack a terrorist camp. He returns home to a hero's welcome, but CIA officer Carrie Mathison (Claire Danes) suspects that he may have been turned against the US during his captivity.

Producer: Torquil MacLeod.