The Film Programme

In a special edition of the programme, Francine Stock looks at a growing number of films aimed at an older audience, known within the industry as the 'grey pound'.Billy Connolly and Tom Courtenay discuss their retirement home comedy, Quartet, the directorial debut of Dustin Hoffman.Francine visits the set of Roger Michell's latest, Le Weekend, starring Jim Broadbent and Lindsay Duncan as a retired couple trying to rekindle the romance of their honeymoon.Analyst Charles Gant reveals the films that made the industry sit up and notice the older cinemagoer, while president of Momentum pictures, Xavier Marchand, discusses his company's future plans for this audience.Plus, Dame Helen Mirren, one of the most bankable British stars of the last 30 years.Producer: Craig Smith.

In a special edition, Francine Stock and guests discuss difficult books adapted for the big screen. Deepa Mehta talks Midnight's Children, Ang Lee reveals the challenges of making Life of Pi, and Walter Salles discusses On the Road. Meanwhile, Sir Christopher Frayling, critic Tim Robey, and screenwriter Tony Grisoni look back over the years at cinema's attempts at realising 'unfilmable' books.Producer: Craig Smith.

Francine Stock meets with Ang Lee to discuss Life of Pi, the hugely anticipated big screen adaptation of Yan Martel's novel. Ewan McGregor reveals his reluctance to take on the part of a father searching for his family in the aftermath of the 2004 Asian tsunami in The Impossible, directed by Juan Antonio Bayona. Critic Nigel Floyd picks out his favourite films showing on television over Christmas.And Peter Jackson talks about his involvement with West of Memphis, a documentary focusing on the case of three teenagers arrested for the murders of three 8 year old children. Producer: Craig Smith.

Francine Stock talks to Sir Peter Jackson about his new film The Hobbit, An Unexpected Journey, the first in a trilogy of films adapting the enduringly popular masterpiece The Hobbit by J R R Tolkien, which was published 75 years ago this year. Sir Ian McKellan reprises his role as Gandalf from The Lord of The Rings trilogy, and the film also stars Andy Serkis as Gollum, Christopher Lee as Saruman and Cate Blanchett as Galadriel.Critic Alice Tynan on Hobbit mania: with commemorative stamps and coins, and Air New Zealand inflight safety video featuring air crew dressed as Hobbit characters, will it outstrip that provoked by The Lord of the Rings trilogy when the New Zealand government appointed a new Minister especially for the film?As the Golden Globes nominations are released, critic Tim Robey and Clare Binns, Director of Programming and Acquisitions at Picture House, look back at the films of 2012.And film journalist Chris Laverty provides a master class in how to read the subtle clues in costume design whi

Francine Stock meets with director Martin McDonagh and actor Sam Rockwell to discuss their new film, Seven Psychopaths.Neil Brand deconstructs the distinctive score for Akira Kurosawa's 1961 samurai Western - Yojimbo.We sample a fine Bordeaux, the French film Tu Sera Mon Fils (You Will be My Son), a dynastic drama set in a vineyard, starring Niels Arestrup.As Britain's largest independent cinema chain, Picturehouse, joins forces with Cineworld, what does this mean for cinemagoers? Clare Binns, director of programming at Picturehouse, explains all. Mother and son team, Charlotte Rampling and Barnaby Southcombe, discuss their London neo-noir film, I, Anna. Producer Craig Smith.

This week Francine meets with Ralph Fiennes who, fresh from Skyfall, is now rattling his leg-irons as Magwitch in Mike Newell's Great Expectations. Critic Ben Walters casts an eye over several films dealing with gay and transgender issues from Laurence Anyways and Keep the Lights On to the documentary, Call Me Kuchu, which paints a harsh picture of life as a homosexual in Uganda. Then two go psycho in a motorhome in Ben Wheatley's Sightseers. Comedy duo Alice Lowe and Steve Oram on their horror flick about caravanning and rage.And sticking with the outlandish, graphic novelist Alan Moore discusses his Northampton-style noir which he hopes will form a new model for filmmaking. Producer: Craig Smith.

Colin Firth on his new film Gambit, and why he never expected to play posh people. The man behind Festen, Danish director Thomas Vinterberg, discusses his timely drama The Hunt, about a nursery teacher accused of wrongdoing. Cinema owner Kevin Markwick tracks the origins of advertising on the big screen, unearthing ads from as far back as the 1890s. And critic Peter Bradshaw on the power of The Passion of Joan of Arc, Carl Theodor Dreyer's classic from 1928. Producer: Craig Smith.

Francine Stock and guests look at Michael Haneke's latest, Amour, starring Jean-Louis Trintignant and Emmanuelle Riva who face the end together in their Paris apartment. Is Haneke the greatest living European filmmaker? Dr Catherine Wheatley and critic Jonathan Romney consider. Bradley Cooper discusses his dance around disruptive personality disorders in the romcom Silver Linings Playbook.Fashion journalist Chris Laverty pulls apart Ben Affleck's garb in Argo. And from 1970, there's romance - with more than a dash of satirical comedy - across the racial divide in a New York suburb on the verge of gentrification in Hal Ashby's The Landlord. We talk to its star, Beau Bridges. Producer: Craig Smith.

Ben Affleck on directing and starring in his Iranian hostage thriller, Argo. Director Sally El Hossaini on her award-winning debut, My Brother The Devil, set in the crime-ridden estates of Hackney. And director Paul Thomas Anderson talks about The Master, his enigmatic film that's generating so much debate.Producer: Craig Smith.

Francine Stock meets with French director Jacques Audiard to discuss his award-winning film Rust and Bone, an ominous story on the sunlit Cote d'Azur. Irish charmer Chris O'Dowd, on playing the impromptu manager of an Australian girl group, The Sapphires, touring war-torn Vietnam. Neil Brand is behind the piano to deconstruct Jonny Greenwood's score to one of the most anticipated films of the year, Paul Thomas Anderson's The Master. And historian Ian Christie looks at the Ealing films with a dark heart. Producer: Craig Smith.

Daniel Craig on being James Bond, working with Sam Mendez and Her Majesty the Queen. Actor Martin Compston discusses his new film Sister, set in the seedy underbelly of the Swiss ski slopes. Is Stanley's Kubrick's film The Shining just a horror film? Or is it about the Holocaust, the moon landing, or the massacre of Native Americans? A new documentary, Room 237, claims it's about all three - and more. We hear from its director, Rodney Ascher. Plus Sir Christopher Frayling and critic Adam Smith discuss the pros and cons of film theory. Producer: Craig Smith.

Apocalypse looms in the waterlogged deep south of America - director Benh Zeitlin talks Beasts of the Southern Wild. Cinema owner Kevin Markwick gives a potted history of the ad reel. Filmmaker Sally Potter discusses her latest, Ginger and Rosa, a teenage drama set at the start of the Cold War. And critic Scott Jordan Harris reveals his film of the year - a three hour epic - Woody Allen: A Documentary, directed by Robert B. Weide. Producer: Craig Smith.

Veteran actor Martin Landau discusses his role as the wise - if sinister - science teacher in Tim Burton's retro-fable Frankenweenie. Author Michael Morpurgo reflects on the two very different screen treatments of his books, War Horse and Private Peaceful. We reveal the winner of the first Wellcome Trust Screenwriting Prize, intended to encourage more and better scripts about science.Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris, the team behind Little Miss Sunshine, discuss their new film Ruby Sparks, about a novelist whose fictional creation comes to life. Producer: Craig Smith.

Francine Stock discusses the long-awaited screen adaptation of Jack Kerouac's On the Road with the film's director, Walter Salles. Author and film historian, David Thomson, outlines his fears for the future of cinema. Clare Stewart, new director of the BFI London Film Festival, on her vision for this year's festival. Critic and journalist Karen Krizanovich on Sam Fuller's Park Row from 1952, a feisty flick chronicling the early days of the New York newspaper industry. Producer: Craig Smith.

This week Francine Stock meets with Kylie Minogue to discuss her transformation in to a French New Wave starlet in Leos Carax's Holy Motors. Joseph Gordon Levitt describes his preparation for playing the young Bruce Willis in Looper, a film that travels forward (and back) sampling previous sci-fi thrillers. Tahar Rahim, star of A Prophet and Free Men, discusses Arab stereotyping on the big screen. And, Neil Brand is behind the piano to look at the trick of referencing and recycling classic scores in contemporary film. Producer: Craig Smith.

Francine Stock discusses prototype vibrators with Jonathan Pryce, star of Hysteria. Critic Adam Smith reassesses Peter Falk and Gena Rowlands in John Cassavetes A Woman Under The Influence. Oliver Stone's Savages sees Benicio del Toro in a familiar role as the bad-ass Mexican; he discusses Hispanic stereotypes.And an oddity from North Korea - Comrade Kim Goes Flying - the first ever UK/Belgian/North Korean co-production. Producer: Craig Smith.

In a programme specially recorded at Toronto International Film Festival, Francine Stock reports back on the best, the most expensive, the most moving and the maddest of the nearly 300 films on show. She speaks to Roger Michell about his latest film, Hyde Park on Hudson, set in 1939 as the first British monarch to visit the US (Sam West as King George VI) arrives at the president's upstate New York country house (Bill Murray as FDR). Jack Kerouac's iconic novel On The Road finally makes it to the screen, and director Walter Salles explains how he set about filming it. Artistic director Cameron Bailey outlines the scale and scope of the Toronto festival, and the highlights are discussed and debated by Clare Binns and Tim Robey. And Francine catches up with Terence Stamp, soon to be seen in a new film alongside Vanessa Redgrave, Song for Marion. Producer: Craig Smith.

Francine Stock talks to Joe Wright about "Anna Karenina" - adapted for the screen by Tom Stoppard and starring Keira Knightly, Jude Law and Aaron Taylor-Johnson.Sandra Hebron discusses the numerous screen adaptations of Tolstoy's epic novel, including Clarence Brown's 1935 version starring Greta Garbo and Frederic March, and the Alexander Korda picture produced in 1948 with Vivien Leigh, Ralph Richardson and Kieron Moore.John Hillcoat and Nick Cave discuss Lawless. Lawless is directed by John Hillcoat (his previous works include The Road and The Proposition) and Nick Cave adapted the screenplay from Matt Bondurant's book "The Wettest Country In The World", a fictional account of the exploits of his paternal grandfather. Nick Cave also composed the music with Warren Ellis.Portugese film director Miguel Gomes discusses his third feature film, "Tabu", a film which probes Portugal's colonial past through the medium of cinema - with reference to Murnau's 1931 film Tabu, A Story of the South Seas.Producer: Hilary D

Matthew Sweet meets with actor Toby Jones to discuss the weird word of the Berberian Sound studio, director Peter Strickland's love letter to Italian horror films of the 1970s. How do you make money from a British film? Producers Lisa Marie Russo and Matthew Justice discuss. Plus, Mark Gatiss rounds off his selection of favourite biopics with Gods and Monsters, starring Ian Mckellan as director James Whale. Producer: Craig Smith.

Matthew Sweet meets with director James Marsh to discuss his IRA drama Shadow Dancer, starring Clive Owen and Andrea Riseborough. Northern Ireland correspondent for the Independent newspaper David Mckittrick looks at the portrayal of the IRA on film. Mark Gatiss continues his selection of biopics - this week, Carey Grant as Cole Porter in Night and Day. Director Bart Layton on his compelling drama-doc The Imposter, which tells the story of a Frenchman who convinces a Texan family he is their son who has been missing for several years. Producer: Craig Smith.