Redemption through repetition. While that vaguely Orwellian sentiment may sound like the sort of thing dreamt up by the propaganda mandarins of Kim Jong Un or the spin doctors of some backwoods cult, it is in fact the thematic heartbeat of Doug Liman’s impressively original time-twisting film Edge of Continue Reading
Marvellous massing of movie trailers: The Big Ask, Kill the Messenger, Calvary, The Angriest Man in Brooklyn, What We Do in the Shadows
For this instalment’s introduction, I adapted ever so slightly (or a lot) the words to a children’s song “Yes we have no bananas” … Yes we have no bananas We have no bananas today [But] we have trailers and trailers Trailers and trailers And all kinds of trailers, and Continue Reading
Now this is music #30: Tiger Dare, Like Swimming, Banks, Elin Lanto, Little Daylight
Picture yourself for a moment in a large public demonstration. Throngs of people, iPods and iPhones and sundry other listening devices to their ears, all shouting with one accord (and of out tune and sync because let’s face it they can’t hear a thing with all that music playing): Continue Reading
Movie review: The Fault in our Stars
“That’s the thing about pain. It demands to be felt.” With these sombre if realistic words, Augustus Waters (Ansel Elgort), witty, confident, winningly-articulate Augustus Waters, encapsulates the bold sentiment that runs unapologetically through both the book by John Green, and now it’s masterfully faithful adaptation by Josh Boone. The Continue Reading
Music review: Do It Again EP by Robyn & Röyksopp
If there was a marriage made in musical heaven, it’s the union of Swedish pop superstar Robyn, and Norwegian electronic music duo Röyksopp (Svein Berge and Torbjørn Brundtland) who together have released the diverse and yet enjoyably cohesive mini-album Do It Again. The product of an already long-existing creative partnership Continue Reading
Stories in small boxes #2: Pearls Before Swine
You get the impression that Stephan Pastis, one time insurance claims litigator and now irreverently funny and über-successful cartoonist of hit comic strip Pearls Before Swine, is the kind of man who doesn’t like to play it safe. Well, not any longer, anyway. Realising after one year of law Continue Reading
Nothing one able-bodied female can’t handle: Vale Ann B Davis aka Alice from The Brady Bunch
We all know that time passes way too fast. But the sheer rate of knots at which it travels, dragging us along with it in its wake, hits home when someone from your childhood dies and you’re left wondering where all that time actually went. It’s probably why the Continue Reading
Movie review: X-Men Days of Future Past
With the vast number of movies dipping their dystopian toes into the grim waters of the post-apocalyptic future, you could be forgiven for wanting to bury all your calendars, switch off any computing device with more memory than a toaster and hightailing it to a remote cabin in the Continue Reading
Want a book from the fabulous Amy Poehler? YES PLEASE!
I am fairly certain … no wait, I know beyond a shadow of a doubt in fact … that Amy Poehler is the funkiest, coolest, funniest, female entertainer on the planet at the moment. * It stands to reason then that if you have achieved that exalted status, and Continue Reading
Here comes the Fall … TV! Send in the Superheroes
If you’re anything like me, and if you’re drinking you’re meds-laced Snapple and faithfully attending weekly therapy sessions you probably aren’t, the headline to this post likely has you humming “Send in the Clowns”. And if it hadn’t inspired that particularly annoying piece of retro ear candy, it has Continue Reading