TV / DVD

Watch The Borgias and you will be entertained by a gripping, sumptuous drama telling the story of Rodrigo Borgia, a man who schemed, bribed and poisoned his way to become Pope Alexander VI. This nine-part series follows the rise of the despotic Borgia family as they struggle to maintain their grip on power.

Actor Jeremy Irons is so convincing as Rodrigo that he makes God's envoy on earth appear "human" despite the inhumane methods he uses. Murder, intrigue, treachery and sex make this so much more than a stilted costume drama - although the costumes are stunning.

There are three comedians that I think embody the stand-up scene today: Frankie Boyle, talented but toxic; Michael McIntyre, pleasantly babbling like Boris Johnson's bozo blood brother; and Stewart Lee who is, apparently, the current comedian's comedian.

Stewart Lee's stand-up divides opinion. Not fluffy or feel-good (unless you enjoy his riffs), he does upset people. Fortunately he upsets the right people.

Two key works of Soviet cinema are newly available with the DVD release of Zvenigora and Arsenal. They are the fruit of silent cinema's final maturity before an imminent eclipse ushered in by the talkies and (with graver finality) Stalinism.

"Light 'em all up," comes the voice on the radio as we see footage from an Apache gunship over Baghdad in 2007. A group of men are then mown down by machine gun fire. "Nice," continues the voice, impressed at the carnage. This footage was never before shown on TV.

This is the war we don't see - the daily violence of the "war on terror". Instead we are served a diet of false stories about weapons of mass destruction and imminent terrorist attacks, repeated on loop 24 hours a day and awarded an unquestioning reverence.

The 100-page accompanying booklet makes grandiose claims for the significance of these films but the reality is quite different: this box set is not worth buying and only a handful of these films are worth watching even once.

In fact this set is only worth reviewing because it throws an interesting sidelight on the relationship between socialist politics and film, culture and art.

You can see the issue played out clearly enough in the recently released feature Made in Dagenham.

Agnès Varda heads backwards through the sands, weaving together memories of her life, clips of her own films, and images of her friends and neighbours (some celebrities, many not).

She is retracing her steps and, in her own words, "imagining oneself as a child is like running backwards". Now 80 years old, having successfully experimented with photography, cinematography and documentary, Varda combines them all in a film about her own life. But with Varda it is never that simple.

The Battle of Chile is a masterpiece of political documentary, yet until recently it has been almost impossible to get a copy of it. Its release for the first time on DVD is therefore to be warmly welcomed.

Cry, The Beloved Country was first released in 1952. It is based on the novel by Alan Paton, released in 1948, just four months before the racist National Party, which introduced the legal system of apartheid, took power in South Africa.

Paton won numerous awards for his novel, and it was an important work in its time - it raised the plight of black people in South Africa to an international audience.

Agnès Varda, director and screenwriter, was the lone woman among the major figures in the French New Wave, or more particularly the Left Bank, movement. The movement is associated with a rebellion against the traditional form of films - using unusual camera shots and unexpected turns of plot. Many of these films were experimental and were produced on a low budget. The Left Bank directors were non-conformist and bohemian in their lives as well as their films, and were identified with the political left.

Over the past decade Venezuela has become a focus for socialists and activists across the world. It has shown us a glimpse of the possibilities of a mass fightback from below and of ordinary people working shoulder to shoulder to define their own future.