We recently signed up to Mubi, which has a daily updated set of 20, usually pretty interesting, films, and I like that it shrinks the otherwise terrifying range of possibilities. Over the last week or two I’ve seen Primer, Shane Carruth’s rather brilliant debut, made for $7,000. It’s a sort of naturalistic sci-fi, brilliantly conceived and made with such an unfussy, assured tone.

We watched a couple of Joseph Losey films – I thought I might warm to him more but haven’t. I liked the Brazilian film Bacurau a lot. Kleber Filho’s other film, Neighbouring Sounds, is good too.

I’ve been watching Outnumbered with the kids. The writing is so good and the kids get a lot out of seeing versions of their own flailing parents represented on screen.

The experience so far has confirmed what I already suspected: I am nothing like as good a parent as Ma [Brie Larson’s character] in Room; not as patient or resourceful. The TV would have been on 24/7 had it been me in charge. I suppose that the idea we were trying to capture is that scale is relative, that if you really pay attention to where you are there is more there than you think.

We’ve been at home so much and it is true that the place feels larger and more varied than it would crashing in at night after a day working. There are bad days but we are lucky in that we have enough space and a garden, and crucially an excellent dog. Most days are all right and it turns out that the place, or the idea of the place, is elastic enough to contain it all.

I’m not often drawn to films about contagions or global disasters or whatever. The high concept takes up so much energy when all the fundamental stuff about people is present in ordinary life. Maybe great work will come out of this moment but I’d bet it won’t be about the pandemic, not directly anyway.

• Normal People is available in full on the BBC iPlayer on 26 April; weekly double episodes begin on BBC One on 27 April.