Reviews:

• "Scanning the schedules on Saturday for alternatives to the vast amounts of music on offer, one might have been forgiven for dismissing The Da Vinci Detective as part of the lumbering behemoth of hype that accompanied the release of the film of The Da Vinci Code.  Which would have been a shame as, apart from the fact that its subject, real-life Da Vinci expert Dr. Maurizio Seracini, got a mention in Dan Brown's book, there was no other connection.  And it was no less fascinating for that.
  
  In fact, Seracini's story had all the elements of ambition, conflict and resolution that make up many a good thriller.  An engineer and forensic scientist by profession, his passion for art history, and the old masters in particular, led Seracini into that strange hinterland where science seeks to throw empirical light on the ethereality of art. Most of this lengthy but absorbing documentary covered his 30-year quest to find a missing Da Vinci masterpiece, the Battle of Anghiari, painted in 1440. [Actually 1505] And how, in the face of scathing scepticism from the art establishment, he pieced crumb after tantalising crumb of evidence together to support an increasingly credible theory – that the painting was preserved behind another laid over it in Florence's Palazzo Vecchio in the 16th century.
  
  Locked in a stalemate over permission to conduct a final test that would prove his theory once and for all, Seracini's attention was diverted when the Uffizi museum asked him to assess whether their most precious Da Vinci painting, Adoration of the Magi, was robust enough to survive major restoration work.  True to his controversial form, Seracini found incontrovertible proof that Leonardo hadn't actually painted it at all.  But at least he was able to use his technical wizardry to recover a perfect image of the even more magnificent drawing underneath the paint – which was definitely Da Vinci's."

Daily Telegraph, 22/5/06

• "Though only 15 of Leonardo's paintings survive, they remain some of the world's most enigmatic and mysterious works of art.  Armed with the latest technological gizmos, Seracini uses his powers of detection to investigate two of them – the unfinished Adoration of the Magi and the Battle of Anghiari, the masterpiece that disappeared into thin air 500 years ago.  Or did it?"

Daily Mail, 20/5/06

• "A fine example of a documentary… Seracini's investigation into the Adoration of the Magi is set against the equally fascinating backdrop of his 30-year quest for the Renaissance man's Battle of Anghiari, a mural lost for almost half a millennium." *****

Financial Times, 20/5/06

• "This programme follows the controversial scientist on the trail of two fascinating unsolved mysteries from his case file on the Renaissance genius Leonardo da Vinci."

Daily Star, 20/5/06

• "A high-tech sleuth finds a hollow space behind a mural in an Italian palazzo and believes he may have discovered a Da Vinci masterpiece that's been missing for over 400 years  It could be a scene from th movie of The Da Vinci Code, but this is a real-life thriller in which Maurizio Seracini, an expert in pioneering forensic science, goes on the trail of unsolved mysteries that he claims will rock the art world."

TV Guide, 20/5/06

•  "…it seems we can't avoid programmes about The Da Vinci Coide at the moment.  However, this documentary offers something a little different…"

Edinburgh Evening News, 19/5/06

• "Art meets science and detective story meets documentary in a film that aims to shed light on art controversies…"