What's On the Box this week?

THE BIG STORY (RTE 1, Sunday) - While US SCUD missiles were pointed at Baghdad during the 1991 Gulf war, most of the media left the city. Maggie O'Kane decided to stay and report on the invasion. She has since reported from many war zones most notably Bosnia during the early 90s for The Guardian newspaper. Her reports centred on the everyday lives of the Bosnian people caught up in the war. In 2003 O'Kane's career took a new direction when she was appointed Editorial Director of Guardian Films, a documentary unit using the journalistic resources of the newspaper to create programmes for television and the web. The unit has also been successful with exploring innovative ways of telling stories. _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ WILDEST DREAMS (BBC 1, Wednesday) -Wildest Dreams pits nine amateur wildlife enthusiasts against each other in one of the natural world's greatest and most dangerous arenas - Africa - as they compete for the prize of landing a job at the BBC's prestigious Natural History Unit. Nick Knowles and award-winning wildlife film-maker James Honeyborne are joined by a team of specialist experts who not only judge the competitors but also keep them safe in a hostile environment. For the hopefuls, including a factory night-shift worker with a passion for wildlife photography and an ex-fast-food restaurant manager who spends her weekends tracking otters, the adventure starts on day one with an assignment to film elephants from the water. Armed with cameras, local guides and expert advice from elephant specialist Dr Kate Evans, the teams have to first master their transport - an unstable canoe called the mokoro. Only one of the rookies - James - manages to film an elephant, but he takes a huge risk by standing up in the wobbly vessel. The water they are surrounded by is full of hippos and crocodiles so if they capsize they could become lunch. _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ MIDSOMER MURDERS (ITV, Wednesday) - Ah, the peaceful and tranquil English country village - a place where dahlias and death seem to go hand in hand. The peaceful setting of prestigious Whiteoaks Golf Club is rocked by death and controversy when a golfer is bludgeoned to death near the notorious 13th hole known as Crisp's Folly. Barnaby and Jones discover gambling is rife at the club, along with illegal money-lending and assault. Then as the club considers giving ordinary villagers full membership rights, another golfer is killed. As the killer is revealed as a left-hander, Barnaby realises the deaths could be linked to the imminent meeting of Whiteoaks' membership committee….as if we ever doubted it. _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ ASHES TO DIAMONDS (CH4, Friday) - Deciding what to do with a relative's ashes can be a serious dilemma, but now there are increasing options available to those left behind and the ashes business is booming. David sets out to meet families across the UK who have chosen some of the most surprising, adventurous and unusual ways to say goodbye to their departed's ashes. Fifty years ago, only 28% were cremated. Today 72% of British people are turning to ash, leaving over 1,000 tonnes of dead matter to deal with each year. As a result, an ashes industry is burgeoning. Where it was once acceptable to sprinkle your beloved under a favourite tree, people are now thinking more laterally, and the sky's the limit, literally. Ashes to Diamonds is a heartfelt, eye-opening, and at times funny film exploring how creative some Brits are becoming when it comes to making plans for cremated remains _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ BANG GOES THE THEORY (BBC 1, Monday) - Dallas Campbell, Liz Bonnin, Jem Stansfield and Dr Yan Wong take on the scientific world by devising their own ingenious ways of explaining cutting-edge developments in technology. The first episode tackles gait recognition, vortex rings, genetic engineering and an uncooked egg. There are already many millions of CCTV cameras across the planet, but researchers are still investigating even more effective methods of surveillance. Dallas and Liz head to Southampton to find out about a new system of gait recognition that could track each and every one of us, by monitoring the way that we move. Tackling the science behind the headlines, Liz journeys to meet a US scientist who is developing his own controversial solution to solving the world's energy crisis. Craig Venter, one of the first people to sequence the human genome, is working to create the first generation of artificial life. _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________ MOVIE OF THE WEEK: HALF NELSON (BBC 1, Thursday) - The ever-excellent Ryan Gosling plays a drug-addicted history teacher in an inner-city school deep in the heart of Brooklyn who eschews the provided curriculum in favour of heartfelt lectures about understanding the past rather than just memorising it. The film focuses on Dan and his relationship with Drey, a 13-year-old student of his who catches him in the bathroom smoking crack after school one day.