Thomas Sutcliffe

Do the black and white thing: Exemplary 'goodness' is depicted twice in Michael Haneke's film 'The White Ribbon'

Tom Sutcliffe: It's about as good as it gets

The Week In Culture

Recently by Thomas Sutcliffe

Tom Sutcliffe: The over-complicated life of Belle de Jour

Tuesday, 17 November 2009

I wonder how many men looked at the photograph of Dr Brooke Magnanti – who outed herself the other day as the real Belle de Jour, blogger horizontale – and thought to themselves, "Yeah ... well I reckon I'd pay £300 for that". I know I did – and it's not because I'd pay £300 for that.

Tom Sutcliffe: The very model of a modern museum

Friday, 13 November 2009

The Week In Culture

Tom Sutcliffe: A massacre that may or may not be art

Wednesday, 11 November 2009

A few months ago the Mexican film-maker Guillermo Del Toro, the director of Pan's Labyrinth, gave an interview to Wired magazine in which he predicted that "in the next 10 years there will be an earthshaking Citizen Kane of games".

Tom Sutcliffe: It's good to be strung along

Friday, 6 November 2009

The Week In Culture

Tom Sutcliffe: Let's be clear about what we're eating

Tuesday, 3 November 2009

It hasn't really been a good few days for this Government, when it comes to the relationship between simple scientific facts and public health. Their commitment to giving the people the facts doesn't apparently extend to giving them facts that might contradict current political orthodoxies. But they do have a modest opportunity this week to show themselves to be on the side of useful scientific intelligence. Tomorrow, the House of Commons debates a 10-Minute Rule Bill put forward by the Labour MP Helen Southworth, in which she calls for a legal requirement for a uniform system of food labelling on the front of packaged food.

Tom Sutcliffe: It's time for tough love at the Tate

Friday, 23 October 2009

I tend to think of Bullets Over Broadway when I hear about collaborative artworks, Woody Allen's 1994 comedy being a near-perfect parable of the ruthlessness necessary for high artistic achievement. In the film, a mob enforcer with only rudimentary education (he burned his school down) is given the job of looking after a gangster's moll who has been given a starring part in a Broadway play in return for a hefty investment.

Tom Sutcliffe: It's time to admit flying is a luxury

Tuesday, 20 October 2009

Forgive me Gaia for I have sinned – or rather I'm about to. This weekend I'm flying to Washington with a son – an 18th-birthday present inspired by his passion for the West Wing – and at a stroke every climate-friendly choice I've made in the last few years has been blown. No point feeling smug about driving a Toyota Pious (as my children mockingly call it). No real point either in wondering whether the solar water panels on the roof are ever likely to justify their existence or patting myself on the back for a quasi-religious devotion to recycling. I have, of course, paid the surcharge for a carbon offset, but if I'm honest I don't want to look too closely at the mechanisms of that scheme for fear of discovering that its only effectiveness is in persuading people to overcome their doubts about taking a flight in the first place. And there's absolutely no good pretending that this trip is an unavoidable necessity because it isn't. It's for fun and – beneath shifting and variable levels of guilt – I'm looking forward to it. Even the flying bit.

Tom Sutcliffe: When a film is not a film

Friday, 16 October 2009

When the Cannes organisers invited Disney/ Pixar to present Up as the opening film of the 2009 festival they made history.

Tom Sutcliffe: No fair trials in the court of public opinion

Tuesday, 13 October 2009

I heard the phrase "the Court of Public Opinion" quite a few times yesterday morning – prompted by interviews and discussions anticipating the fact that MPs were all going to get a letter from Sir Thomas Legg and a lot of them weren't going to like it.