BBC Four Goes Slow is eight programmes that refuse to hurry. From 3 May 2015 to 29 August 2016 the strand screened a 180-minute drift through the National Gallery, three episodes watching artisans make a jug, knife and chair, an hour of Devon dawn birdsong, and three real-time travelogues: a narrowboat crawling along the Kennet and Avon, a reindeer sleigh crossing Norwegian tundra at twilight, and the 830 Dalesman bus climbing Buttertubs Pass.
No voice-over, no music, no edits beyond the necessities of transmission. The bus ride became the channel’s biggest hit of 2016, peaking at nearly a million viewers and outrating The Bourne Legacy on Film 4. Critics called it “hypnotic” or “the most boring TV show ever”; viewers on Twitter were similarly split between derision and gratitude for a “proper programme”.
Channel editor Cassian Harrison pitched the series as deliberate resistance to television’s accelerating grammar, borrowing the Norwegian slow-TV craze that had already sent seven-hour train rides and twelve-hour knitting marathons up the ratings. After the original run, BBC Four revived the All Aboard! brand for a 2018 reindeer migration across 160 miles of Finnmark and a 2020 triptych of New Zealand rail, road and sea legs from Auckland to Milford Sound.
Production Details
BBC Four / 1 Season / 8 Episodes / 2015
Main Cast
