Camilla Swift

First things first. Yes, Val d’Isère does have a reputation for being expensive — and it is, especially if you’re planning on eating out and embracing the après ski every night. But no matter what anyone says, you can’t argue with the fact that the skiing is fantastic. Combined with its neighbour, Tignes, there’s a total of 330km of piste to explore, with plenty of steep red and blue runs that are perfect for intermediate and advanced skiers. One of the most frequent complaints about skiing in Val is getting home at the end of the day. Almost every route down to the main town is a challenge, even if you are fairly competent at descending mountains with a couple of planks strapped to your feet.

The latest adaptation of one of Trainspotting author Irvine Welsh's books is Filth  - a film so filthy that Deborah Ross had to ‘endure’ the film ‘from behind her hands’. But, somewhere amongst the ‘enduring’, she became ‘strangely hooked’, as Bruce Robertson (aka James McAvoy) led her through Edinburgh’s ‘dark underbelly of general horridness’. Filth may be ‘ghastly and unpleasant, but also kind of brilliant’, says Ross. Here’s the trailer: Breaking Bad started off with mixed reviews and an ‘uncertain future’, as it ‘dumbfounded viewers and critics alike’ – at least according to the economics professor Steffen Huck.

When you hear the words ‘English art’, there are very few people who would immediately think of embroidery. As Dan Jones said when he was asked if he would like to present a programme about ‘the golden age’ of English embroidery, ‘Embroidery? What, like sewing?’ But accept the offer he did, and found that there’s a lot more to embroidery, as an art form, than ‘just’ sewing. In this week’s magazine he writes about everything he learnt about ‘one of English history’s most underappreciated art forms’. Here's a clip from one of the previous 'Fabric of Britain' programmes - this one on knitting. Downton Abbey has returned to our screens for its fourth season. Is that a reason to crack open a bottle?

Just 9 months after the horsemeat scandal revealed that products labelled as beef did, in fact, contain horsemeat, one might have expected the food standards authority to have cracked down on food labelling – particularly when it comes to meat. But in an investigation broadcast earlier this week by the BBC’s Farming Today programme, a reporter bought a pork chop ‘at random’ from Tesco. It was labelled with the ‘Red Tractor’ logo, which ought to mean that it ‘is fully traceable back to independently inspected farms in the UK’. However, lab tests showed that the meat probably came from a Dutch farm – in fact there’s less than a 1% chance that the meat came from a British farm.

The Great British Bake Off – or 'GBBO', as it's known to the more dedicated fans – is one of the breakthrough television programmes of the past few years. It started off as ‘just another’ cookery show – albeit with a reality twist. But now, as Season 4 kicks off, it has attracted a loyal and devoted following. Just what is it about baking that attracts such an audience, wonders Clarissa Tan in her TV review this week. Perhaps it's the sharing quality of cake - 'after all, baking is communal, isn't it?' But there's also the sheer patriotism of the programme. 'Little Union flags... all the foodstuffs that make Britain great', and a 'national pride [that] spills over to embrace the world'. Maybe cake will bring everyone together, after all.

Normally, August is a rubbish time of year for films, as this week’s cinematic offerings prove. But, says Deborah Ross, there’s one release this week which is worth seeing, and that’s Kuma. An Austrian-Turkish project, it focuses on the life of Ayse, who is married off and moved to Vienna, where she finds that she’s actually been married off to the father of the person she thought she’d married – and as his second wife. It might all sound a bit confusing, but Deborah says it’s beautifully acted and ‘would shine bright at any time of year’, so I’ll hold her to her word. What has happened to our television comedies?

The simplest and best way to get straight to the heart of the Highlands from London is by sleeper. Board in Euston, have a plate of haggis and tatties (and perhaps a nip of whisky to knock you out) and before you know it, you’ll wake up the next morning as the train crosses Rannoch Moor. Don’t think about the fact that the train line is effectively floating on a bed of earth and tree roots, since the peat soil was too soft to support its weight. Admire the view — and keep your eyes peeled for the red deer who congregate along the line. Stepping off at Fort William, you’d be forgiven for being unimpressed by your choice of destination: you emerge into a Morrisons car park.

In January of this year, Melissa Kite wrote our cover story about how the RSPCA has morphed from being an animal welfare charity into an animal rights group.  She wrote of the ‘culture of fear at their headquarters’, and explained ‘how deeply suspicious some animal experts have become of this once-respected body’. Since then, the problems have only worsened. In July it was revealed that the charity’s Chief Executive, Gavin Grant, was paid ‘between £150,000 and £160,000’ a year – at least £30,000 more than his predecessor.

Has the British establishment been taken over by men from the Commonwealth? What with a Canadian in charge of the Bank of England, an Aussie strategy advisor for the Tories, a South African advising the Lib Dems, and — let's not forget — a Zimbabwean coaching our cricket team, it does seem as if alpha males from the former empire are in charge. In this week's podcast, James Forsyth discusses his cover essay on 'The New Colonials', and explains what makes them so successful. He’s joined by Ruth Porter from the Institute of Economic Affairs, a New Zealand citizen who is also married to a Kiwi, as they attempt to get to the bottom of the mystery. Surely, argues James, it makes sense to strengthen our bond with the ‘dominions’, rather than looking to Europe?

The BBC’s Proms kick off today, with the First Night of the Proms from the Royal Albert Hall delivering what they describe as ‘a surge of natural energy in sea-inspired works by Britten and Vaughan Williams’. In this week’s magazine, Kate Chisholm speaks to the director of the event, Roger Wright, about the challenges of what sounds like ‘a dream job’, but is in fact 'more like 26-dimensional chess'. Is the next generation being messed up by our celebrity-obsessed culture? That’s the question Sofia Coppola raises with her latest film, The Bling Ring, a film that Deborah Ross thinks ‘might be worth watching just to see Paris’s shoe room’.

The buzzword of the moment seems to be ‘rewilding’. George Monbiot, the Guardian columnist and environmentalist has a new vision for the countryside, which he wrote about in the magazine two weeks ago. Instead of covering our green and pleasant land with sheep, what we ought to be doing, he argues, is re-introducing all of the species which we humans killed off hundreds, if not thousands, of years ago. The process, which he describes as ‘a mass restoration of ecosystems’, would involve repopulating Britain with the elephants, lynx and bison. ‘We live in a shadow land’, he argues in the ‘animated guide’ to rewilding.