Perfection has a price (Black Swan, Darren Aronofsky, US, 2010, 108mins) Darren Aronofsky has said that he intended Black Swan, his fifth film as director, to be a companion piece to its predeccessor The Wrestler, but in many ways the two pictures could not be more different. However, their similarities are also numerous. Both films [...]
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Not Just Another Teen Horror Film (Ginger Snaps, John Fawcett, Canada, 2000, 108 mins) [Warning: Some big spoilers, but the ending is not revealed.] Ginger Snaps is a refreshing take on the horror genre, not least because of the relationship between the two protagonists, one of whom becomes the antagonist. The Fitzgerald sisters have a [...]
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‘We expect it within days.’ And so the waiting starts. ‘Should we go and visit?’ ‘No I don’t think that will be necessary.’ ‘Shall we pray?’ ‘Yes, lets pray’ So we pray, Although I know that I think that God is nonsense, I think we just feel the need to do Something. So we pray, [...]
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Athlone We followed the footsteps Down to the Old Red Gates, Where Frost perched upon The fading paint first laid down By men known only through Wall-mounted moments. Before us sat the endless fields, Which now held only earth; The verge where Ossian fell Bore our sole crop of Bared boards and nails. [...]
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A useful religion The Evolution of God by Robert Wright (Little, Brown and Company, 2009, $25.99, 576 pages) This morning, a friend of mine received a seasonal greeting card from none other than the Obama family itself, dog included. Provided that this card is an exact copy of the presumably thousands which the presidential staff ship [...]
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A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens, Penguin RRP £7.99 Following last year’s horrific film, A Christmas Carol has now become so ubiquitous that it has even inspired a Sony advert. Is there no limit to the bloated monstrosity that Christmas has become, I hear you cry. The answer to that, as I struggle through angry mobs of shoppers on [...]
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Together in Electric Dreams (Tron: Legacy, Joseph Kosinski, US, 2010, 127mins) Some may call it an invidious comparison, but I suspect this once in a generation Tron sequel will be regarded thirty years hence, and possibly a lot sooner than that, as many see the original film now – threadbare, not particularly memorable and heavily [...]
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Lost in thought (Des Hommes et Des Diex, Xavier Beauvois, 2010, 122 minutes) Xavier Beauvois’s meditation on moral obligation and self-sacrifice, set in Algeria in 1996, has acquired quite a reputation for itself. This true story of the struggle of nine Cictercian monks in the face of fundamentalist brutality arrived in UK cinemas with some strong [...]
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Vietnam… In space! The Forever War by Joe Haldeman (Gollancz, RRP£7.99, 256pp) For several years now there has been a rumour that this seminal piece of allegorical sci-fi is to be turned into a film. This is probably based on the idea that the rights have been sold, but Haldeman did that years ago, shortly [...]
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A look at the history of Disney.
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