Set in the bucolically bland world of the toy franchise, the adventures of Freya the rabbit stay well away from any kind of jeopardy

In the very first scene of this film, a woman (well, a female bunny rabbit), broom in hand, sings happily as she sweeps the kitchen floor. Welcome to the wholesome 1950s nostalgia of the Sylvanian Families brand. And while other adaptations of toy franchises whack the audience over the head with irony, skateboards and smart alec gags, this film based on the fuzzy woodland creatures stays firmly on-message. It’s very sweet, slightly dull, and such a throwback that if you stumbled across it on a streaming platform you’d be forgiven for thinking it was made in the 1970s.

It’s set in the bucolically blissful land of Sylvania (though one character pronounces it “Syl-van-ia” so perhaps we’ve all been saying it wrong for years), where bunny Freya is on a mission. It’s her mum’s birthday and Freya wants to give her the perfect present. Each of the film’s chapters takes Freya on a little adventure: first she gets carried off in an autumnal gust while picking flowers to decorate a hat, then she attempts to make her mum a trumpet. The basic animation struggles to get across the highs and low of Freya’s odyssey – it’s such a faithful adaptation the characters look identical to the figures with black bead eyes, and blank faces.

Wardrobe theatre, Bristol
Daisy Kennedy and Mia Macleod tussle with capitalism, class cliches and the cost of living in this smart two-hander

Meet Daisy and Mia. One is working class, the other middle class. One is proud of that, the other embarrassed. Between them they like pints, artisan coffee, ballet and meal deals. A folk song about labour will be performed by one while the other will do a French-inspired mime. Which of them feels skint and which is considered carefree?

If you’ve begun making assumptions then that’s what Scraps is here to question. Daisy Kennedy and Mia Macleod’s two-hander is a merry-go-round of sketches tussling with class cliches and the cost of living crisis. It’s also about the cost of making a play about these complex issues. The title sums up the ragtag nature of its clowning, dance breaks and DIY multimedia. But it also reflects the fights that break out between the pair and suggests the measly leftovers their generation have been handed by the capitalist machine. Home ownership, job security and what you can buy with an hour’s work at minimum wage are all on the agenda here.

At Wardrobe theatre, Bristol , until 2 April

The British-Guyanese singer topped the reggae chart with 1978’s Walk Away, but despite work with Robert Plant and others, she’s rarely returned to the studio. This interview might change that…

In December 1978, Marie Pierre was at No 1 in the UK reggae chart with the lovers rock classic Walk Away, a beautiful tearstained lament on a troubled relationship. Her 1979 debut album Love Affair, powered by another enduring scene song in Choose Me, remained one of Trojan’s best-selling albums well into the 1980s; Pierre, with her crystalline multi-octave voice, seemed destined to follow her contemporary, Silly Games singer Janet Kay, into mainstream pop-reggae success.

But in the 46 years since, Pierre has never released another album. A career that promised so much has – despite TV work and successful backing singing gigs with Robert Plant, Donna Summer and Chaka Khan – been one of frustration and thwarted ambition. Misfortune, mistrust and mistreatment, personal and professional, have sidelined her. “I feel as though I’ve been in chains,” she says on a video call. “I’ve been anchored for no good reason.”

Football manager Gary Caldwell thinks he sounds too ‘aggressive’. But as a fellow Scot, I know the answer isn’t to ‘Englify’ ourselves

The worst job I had was in a bank in Sydney, dealing with a life insurance policy called Lite Life Direct. It was tedious, repetitive and oddly stressful, and involved a lot of time on the phone. What made the situation particularly frustrating was that almost no one could understand my Scottish accent.

“Lite Life Direct,” I would say, three, sometimes four times down the line to no avail. Then I would cave: “Loight Loif Direct.” With my faux-Australian pronunciation, suddenly me and the caller would be simpatico.

Catriona Stewart is a Glasgow-based journalist and broadcaster specialising in politics and home affairs

Michel Hazanavicius’s sentimental tale about a baby found in the woods features sweet little cartoon birds and rabbits as well as the real horror of Nazi death camps

Directed by Michel Hazanavicius, this postmodern Holocaust fairytale premiered at Cannes last year, and turns out to be a dreamy animated curiosity which is certainly different to the icy realist rigour of other films which have appeared there on the same theme, such as Jonathan Glazer’s The Zone of Interest or László Nemes’s Son of Saul. It is adapted from a novella by author and screenwriter Jean-Claude Grumberg (who collaborated with Truffaut on The Last Metro), whose own father was murdered in the Nazi death camps.

The late Jean-Louis Trintignant has his final credit as the narrator, introducing us to scenes that could, at first glance, be from the Brothers Grimm. We see a dense central European forest … through which a second world war Nazi train is seen speeding through, carrying terrified Jews to Auschwitz. One man, with a wife, young child and a baby makes a desperate decision to throw his baby out on to the snowy hillside in the hope that someone finds it – and someone does.

Whether you’re a parent or not, you should be able to talk candidly about how tough it is having kids

A few weeks ago I told my friend – a good friend – that I was considering having a third kid. The colour washed from her face, and before her filter could kick in she said: “Please don’t.” She corrected herself. “You don’t really want to, do you?” I realised she thought I was unhappy. She thought I regretted it all. She was wrong on both accounts, but I didn’t blame her for coming to such a stark conclusion.

That friend was not Chappell Roan. But the pop star is being pelted with the internet equivalent of soiled nappies for saying “all [her] friends who have kids are in hell” and “she doesn’t know anyone who’s happy with children at her age”.

She dressed up as a bullfighter, sat in a window with two magpies and flew colossal flags of warning. We go inside a fascinating new exhibition of photographs by multimedia artist Rose Finn-Kelcey

Work by Sarah Roberts addresses the impact of being a young carer on childhood and the strange feeling of being ‘sick-adjacent’

The leaflets next to the gallery door offering support for carers and for bereavement are an indication of the shattering power of Sarah Roberts’ new work.

Walking into Roberts’ latest installation, Sick (A Note from 40 Sandilands Road and Other Stories), viewers are hit with a disconcerting green, a colour that is supposed to be calming and healing but will resonate differently for those with experience caring for an ill or disabled family member, such as Roberts.

Though the narrative goes the long way round, there are plenty of strong performances and good ideas to keep this journey interesting

Although this British horror flick gets a little muddy in strictly narrative terms with its tricky shifts in viewpoint, it’s rich enough in ideas and strong performances as well as running a blessedly crisp 88 minutes, that any flaws are easily forgiven. The story starts with Anne (Synnove Karlsen, outstanding in a demanding yet slightly underwritten role) waking from a frightening dream and going to join her boyfriend Patrick (Luke Norris) for dinner with another couple, Ryan (George Bukhari) and Jessica (Tessa Parr). The snappy banter between the foursome, which instantly and economically establishes that Patrick is an outright asshole who doesn’t deserve quiet, circumspect Anne, suddenly chills when it’s revealed the two are engaged. Jessica, for one, doesn’t approve, for reasons only revealed later.

Nevertheless, Anne and Patrick depart in the titular vehicle, driven by excessively chatty Ian (Nick Frost, also on exceptional form, and credited with contributing additional material to the script). En route, even more awkward revelations tumble out. From here on in, the film is essentially a two-and-a-half-hander, the story carried by Anne and Ian’s conversation, mostly conducted amid glances in the rear-view mirror as Ian drives, especially after Patrick loses consciousness.

Black Cab is on digital platforms from 7 April.