2016 was not one of my finest years – but then that was in keeping with pretty much everyone else so let’s just chalk it all up to a malevolent calendar and leave it at that shall we? – with the lowest point being the death of my dad Continue Reading
Happy Christmas everyone!
Merry Christmas one and all! It’s my most wonderful time of the year when I can decorate my tree to within one inch of its much-loved life with pop culture ornaments without number – there are a finite number of them but when I start pulling out all the Continue Reading
Poster me this! Adorable Sing posters show characters and voice actors together
SNAPSHOT In a world populated by anthropomorphic animals, a koala named Buster Moon (Matthew McConaughey) works to keep his theater from closing down. To this end, Buster and his sheep friend Eddie (John C. Reilly) hold a singing contest to raise money, and the entire town auditions for a Continue Reading
Book review: The Comet Seekers by Helen Sedgwick
For a novel that quietly and poetically reflects on the nature of human existence, and the way in which we are either adventurous wanderers or quietly domiciled, The Comet Seekers pulses with a relentless energy, a ceaseless push-and-pull quest for belonging and relevance. That energy largely comes from the Continue Reading
On 12th day of Christmas … I listened to Christmas Party by She & Him
There’s an earthy loveliness to pretty much everything She & Him records. With their retro jazz cabaret sensibilities in high gear, and an ability to channel the very essence of Christmas through each and every song, this is on full display on their second festive album Christmas Party kicks off Continue Reading
Santa is coming! No one wants more for Christmas than Pig the Elf
Santa is rightly regarded as a jolly old man with his fingers on the naughty or nice pulse. So on top of the goodness or otherwise of kids around the world we’re told – even it seems their sleep habits and propensity to cry without reason; as “Santa Claus Continue Reading
On 11th day of Christmas … I watched Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas
Emmet Otter’s Jug-Band Christmas, a production of the Jim Henson Company based on Russell and Lillian Hoban’s 1971 book of the same title, is a delight in every sense of the word. Packed full of American folk music-inspired songs composed by Paul Williams, who went on to write “The Rainbow Continue Reading
Feel like Christmas is doomed? Best call in Wes Anderson and Adam Brody!
I am usually the king of Christmas, convinced it’s so irrevocably the most wonderful time of the year that nothing can stand in its tinsel-draped, eggnog-soaked, ornament-decorated way. But after a year in which my dad died, easily the most horrible and difficult thing to happen to me in my Continue Reading
On 10th day of Christmas … I read A Boy Called Christmas by Matt Haig
One of the hardest things to do when you grow up is to recapture that sense of can’t-sleep wonder that once gripped you at Christmas time. As December wound its exciting way ever onwards, adrenaline would pound, anticipation would build and you would find yourself enchanted with every last element Continue Reading
Is it alive? Colony season 2 teaser trailer suggests more unsettling surprises in the offing
Colony was one of the standout shows of 2016. A sophisticated, often tense exploration of the political and social schisms that emerge in society when a mysterious race of aliens arrive and take over the Earth, installing a proxy government to rule in their stead, it was never less Continue Reading