EXCLUSIVE: Filmmaker Luca Guadagnino (Call Me by Your Name) hopes to revive his dream project to make a mammoth 10-episode television adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited.
16.08.2022 - 20:45 / nypost.com
“The Undeclared War” is a hit-or-miss affair.The new espionage drama, premiering Thursday on Peacock, does a lot of “throat clearing” and takes a long-ish time to get to the point — but once it does, the six-episode series offers a healthy dose of twists and turns that, if not riveting, resonate with the current geopolitical climate.The timeframe here is the near-future. It’s April 12, 2024 in London when Britain’s GCHQ (Government Communications Headquarters) is hit with a cyberattack that shuts down virtually the country’s entire online and telecommunications footprint — save for social media.
It’s 15 months after British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was removed from office in “a particularly bloody palace coup” staged by Andrew Mackinde (Adrian Lester), the Conservative Prime Minister who’s in the midst of an intense re-election effort. Russian bots are blamed for the cyberattack: Vladimir Putin is still in power and it’s believed that Russia’s FSB (formerly the KGB) is interfering in the British election for its own nefarious purposes.Enter Saara Parvin (Hannah Khalique-Brown), a brilliant young programmer who’s joining the GCHQ for a year, as a “work experience student” before continuing her university education.
It’s a dream come true for Saara, who beat out many others to earn the internship, and she quickly wins points on her second day on the job when she discovers hidden code in a data “library” (don’t ask, it’s complicated if you’re not a coder) that contains a second virus extinguished by her co-workers (who are none-too-happy to be shown up by a student newbie). The Prime Minister is intent on escalating cyber counter-attacks against Russia’s infrastructure, and after Saara cracks yet another encrypted
.EXCLUSIVE: Filmmaker Luca Guadagnino (Call Me by Your Name) hopes to revive his dream project to make a mammoth 10-episode television adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s Brideshead Revisited.
Vladimir Putin demands absolute fealty to the Russian state, and woe to anyone who defies him.
health has surfaced once again, as the monarch has decided to withdraw from attending the Braemar Gathering in Scotland on Sept. 3.Buckingham Palace confirmed on Friday that the 96-year-old’s son Prince Charles will make an appearance in her absence and represent her at the Highland Games event.The choice to not allow the sovereign to travel was for “comfort” and mobility considerations, a source told The Mirror.The Queen also recently pulled out of visiting London to appoint the newest Prime Minister and to say goodbye to former PM Boris Johnson next week.Instead, Johnson, 58, will jet off to Balmoral Castle in Scotland on Sept.
K.J. Yossman Keira Knightley, Kit Harington, Emeli Sandé and Toby Jones are among the celebrities who’ve signed up to explore their family histories in Wonderhood Studios show “My Grandparents’ War.” The second season of the show, which airs in the U.K. on Channel 4, will explore how the stars’ grandparents navigated global conflicts from the killing fields of Kenya to the mountains of Monte Cassino in Italy. The first season starred Helena Bonham Carter, Mark Rylance, Kristin Scott Thomas and Carey Mulligan. All3Media International distributes the show, which will air on PBS in the U.S., SBS in Australia and CBC in Canada.
Harry Potter 20th anniversary reunion special Return To Hogwarts, and wasn’t blocked from taking part.Return To Hogwarts saw Daniel Radcliffe (Harry Potter), Emma Watson, who played Hermione Granger, and Rupert Grint (Ron Weasley) reunite with other cast members to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the first film in the series based on Rowling’s books, Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone.Upon the show’s airing in January, many critics noted the absence of Rowling, who only appears in archive video clips. There was then speculation that the writer was shut out of the programme after her previous comments about the trans community resulted in a backlash.Speaking to Graham Norton on his Virgin Radio UK show this week, Rowling revealed that she was in fact asked to take part in the show, but decided not to.She said: “I was asked to be on that and I decided I didn’t want to do it,.
BBC Chair Richard Sharp said he has U-turned on feeling the BBC was “bloated, self important and heard too much of its own voice” when he took the job on two years ago.
British soldiers have been told they must be ready for a war against Russia by a senior military officer. Warrant Officer Paul Carney has urged troops to inform their loved ones of potential deployment as the Russian invasion of Ukraine rages on.
“I got permission to go to Russia to help that girl,” Rodman told NBC News this weekend, not saying exactly who he got permission from. “I’m trying to go this week.”Rodman, who won five NBA titles with Michael Jordan during the ’90s while building an image as the NBA’s party-loving bad boy, has become known in the past decade for rubbing elbows with political figures that have tense relationships with the U.S.
Naman Ramachandran At a time when Russia’s invasion of Ukraine continues and a politically fragile U.K. is dealing with daily crises, Peter Kosminsky’s “The Undeclared War” is timely and prescient. Set in a post-pandemic 2024 in the run up to a British general election, the series follows a team of analysts at GCHQ (the U.K.’s version of the NSA) secretly working to ward off a series of cyber attacks by Russia.