Category Archives: Film

The trouble with superheroes taking on terrorism..

Posted on May 10, 2016 by samiraahmed

I love superhero comics and they’ve never been handled with more love than by writers and filmmakers who grew up on them too. And yet.. And yet.. In the latest Captain America Civil War film, when a terrorist bomb goes … Continue reading →

Posted in Comics/graphic novels, Film, Media, Politics, War | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 10 Comments

The man who knew infinity: Difficult history & dreaming spires on film

Posted on April 5, 2016 by samiraahmed

How do we re-visit history? Watching the continuation of the Rhodes Must Fall campaign at Oxford I went to see The Man Who Saw Infinity with a greater consciousness of how our institutions choose to tell their own versions of … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture, Film, History | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 13 Comments

Why Obi Wan Kenobi is pure evil & why R2 D2 is Moses

Posted on March 29, 2016 by samiraahmed

An excellent panel of minds got together at Conway Hall’s latest #LondonThinks event last Thursday to discuss the theology and ethics of Star Wars films. You can watch it in full here on Youtube (below). Or open it in another … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture, Film, History, Media, Religion, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Uncategorized, War | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

How the Space Shuttle Broke My Heart

Posted on March 12, 2016 by samiraahmed

  This weekend’s Radio 4 Extra Floating In Space 3-hour special (9am and 7pm Saturday Mar 1th and iplayer after) with Simon Guerrier explores the history and the fantasy of manned space exploration from the cosmonauts to dreams of Mars … Continue reading →

Posted in Children, Culture, Design, Film, History, Politics, Radio, Science, Science Fiction/Fantasy, TV, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Inside the world of Angels: the secret history of film & TV costumes

Posted on March 2, 2016 by samiraahmed

The chill hits me and a slight tang of…meat. I’ve entered the Fur store room at Angels Costumiers. We stand in silence. There are racks of fur coats – like a multiverse of Narnia entry points. Fox stoles are piled … Continue reading →

Posted in Business/Economics, Culture, Design, Film, History, Media, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Theatre, TV, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Not about “Us”: What the Oscars whitewash reveals about some viewers

Posted on February 8, 2016 by samiraahmed

This column first appeared in the Big Issue magazine – Journalism worth paying for It was one of the most exciting and original nights out I’ve had at the theatre in years – Moliere’s 17th century French satire, Tartuffe, about … Continue reading →

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Is there a transphobic equivalent to blacking up?

Posted on November 25, 2015 by samiraahmed

I wrote a piece for the BBC News website today, originally commissioned about the idea of white actors playing black roles, but I wanted to explore further issues Juliet Jacques had touched on when she came on Front Row recently … Continue reading →

Posted in Culture, Film, History, Media, Theatre, TV, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 5 Comments

Leaving home: The 60s and getting out

Posted on July 24, 2015 by samiraahmed

The roots of this Sunday’s Something Understood for Radio 4 are in one song – The Beatles’ She’s Leaving Home and one time: the 1960s. Over the course of the decade young people found greater opportunity through a huge growth … Continue reading →

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On location for HG Wells and the H Bomb

Posted on July 1, 2015 by samiraahmed

As well as this documentary I’ve written this feature for BBC Culture about how the Atom Bomb changed our culture and imagination. And I discuss it with Robert Elms on BBC London here. Listen from 1 hr 39 minutes. In … Continue reading →

Posted in Books, Film, History, Politics, Radio, Science, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Uncategorized, War | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 22 Comments

Shylock: A Traveller in Time

Posted on May 12, 2015 by samiraahmed

The film producer Davina Belling once said of Jonathan Pryce that she always uses him as a lesson for actors “not to count their lines when they’re offered a role. He had 20 lines in the whole film [Breaking Glass] … Continue reading →

Posted in Comedy, Culture, Film, History, Media, Theatre, Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments