Society has some weirdly orthodox ideas about love. It should occur between people of roughly the same age, an older man with a younger woman (or man) is fine but the reverse, oddly and misogynistically, is not, and marriage is lauded while living together, though commonly practised, is not. Continue Reading
The John Lewis Christmas ad 2017 is here! And so the festive season begins …
Year after gloriously festive year, the Christmas ads of UK department store John Lewis are that one rare exception to featuring commercial ads on this blog. That’s largely because the ads, while obviously selling something, are far more creative than your usual “Hey we have Christmas stuff! Come and Continue Reading
Star Trek Discovery: “Si Vis Pacem, Para Bellum” (S1, E8 review)
SPOILERS AHEAD … AND ALIENS TOO DAMN PEACE-LOVING FOR THEIR OWN GOOD … AND PRETTY MUCH EVERYONE ELSE’S Grab your tie dyed T-shirts! Get used to eating tofu and mung beans! Make love not war and slap a peace sign and some rainbows on a Volkswagen Beetle – it’s Continue Reading
Jane Goodall and her love affair with Africa (documentary)
I have long had a fascination with the natural world. It’s hard to say where it started exactly – the books of Gerald Durrell? The documentaries of David Attenborough? – but one thing is for sure, the magazines of the National Geographic Society, which my parents subscribed to for Continue Reading
Weekend pop art: To every letter of the alphabet, a pop culture icon
Now if you’re anything like me (way older than school age), it’s highly likely you haven’t been asked to recite your ABCs or sing the Alphabet Song for quite some time. Which is a pity because two artists, Tom Whalen and Dave Perillo, who recently exhibited their work at Continue Reading
Godless: “‘Tis a fearful thing, to love what death can touch”
SNAPSHOT Set in the 1880s American West, Godless follows notorious criminal Frank Griffin (Daniels) and his gang of outlaws on a mission of revenge against Roy Goode (O’Connell), a prodigal son type who betrayed his former brotherhood. While on the run, Roy seeks refuge at the ranch of hardened, Continue Reading
Book review: The Last Days of Magic by Mark Tompkins
There is an immersive sense of otherworldliness that must be present in any fantasy tale worth it’s magical salt, if we are to truly buy into its escapist narrative. A sense that you are in a world completely and utterly not your own, and yet, and here lies the Continue Reading
Blade Runner — Constructing a Future Noir #MichaelTucker
SNAPSHOT Blade Runner was the first film to take the deep thematic elements of classic film noirs and put them into a future sci-fi world. This video explores what those elements are, and how they were incorporated. (synopsis (c) Michael Tucker) Blade Runner is rightly hailed as one of Continue Reading
Now this is music #99: Charlotte Gainsbourg, Chela, Rae Morris, Butter, Noah Slee
Ever have those moments in life where you feel like a good song would not only soundtrack things perfectly but add immeasurably to what you’re going to? Or at least emote or articulate better than you’re managing at that point? You’re not alone, and these five artists have not Continue Reading
The short and the short of it: The Inksect and the loss of books and freethinking
SNAPSHOT In a dystopian future where fossil fuels were exhausted, ruling corporations had turned to desperate measures to generate energy. Books were banned & confiscated as fuel for the fire, and with them free thinking had been lost. Human beings had morphed into illiterate cockroaches. In New York City Continue Reading