Saturday 28 February 2009

run fatboy run

it would've been hard for a big pegg fan like myself not to enjoy it. bloody good fun this. little bit american towards the end, but it was directed by one. though he did a very good job of maintaining the heart of british comedy. hurrah!

8/10

mr. apollo

anyone who fancies a laugh could probably get a fair one by clicking here and looking at the cast & crew list of Stallone's latest project.

just reading it gave me a little testosterone rush and made me feel all musclebound and powerful. unfortunately i then felt sterile and hormonal, and shit myself.

Friday 27 February 2009

city of angels

for girls.

and by "for girls" i mean "girls with really bad taste in films" not like SLR who likes die hard and die hard 2. and also has a nice arse.

...

sorry. mind wandered. don't watch this film.

3/10

little shop of horrors

david hurt his tooth.
david went to the dentist.
david was given lots of pain medicine.
david is 7.

Thursday 26 February 2009

army of darkness


there are at least one hundred bloggers in the world, some of which spend hours upon hours deconstructing culture and leaving their smeggy imprint on the world as we spiral into endless decline. it wouldn't surprise me if i was considered one of them, although there are far better reads out there if you are inclined to crawl the blogosphere. in my stuttered attempt to broaden your horizons i'll draw your attention to another regularly updated blog and destroyer of bland, mishka. i'm not entirely certain if it has multiple contributors; and it does dangerously skirt the regions of hipster douchery, but it won't be a waste of your time to stop by every now & again. and i whole-heartedly agree with their views on this cunt.

and they like comics.

but even if you don't like reading (explaining why you've arrived at my blog) you could spend hours just repeatedly clicking refresh and looking through the fine picture gallery in the header bar.


in english terms:

- douches are chavs, but with hollywood breast/face implants.

- hipsters are anyone you see on nathan barley.

- they are all bastards.

grease 2

holy crap! it's rex manning out of empire records as a super-hero biker trying to woo catwoman. hurrah!

4/10

Wednesday 25 February 2009

watchmen

for anyone who is not yet excited about the upcoming watchmen film: click here.

i used to live in the same town as writer Alan Moore. the town is a shit hole, but every now and again you saw Moore skulking around in his dark coat and beard. i never had my copy of watchmen with me though or i'd've swallowed my pride, run up to him and tried to convince him to sign it. whereupon i would slather.

rumour has it, the film is actually awesome.

good.

Tuesday 24 February 2009

what a feeling

robert webb is one half of one of the best british comedy acts around today. this is a little bit of genius.

transformers

in film making terms when you look at script, the flow of the story, exposition, length, continuity, coherance etc. this film was terrible. but it had giant rob'ts that turned into cool cars and twenty minutes in the middle that were really funny. so i'm gonna be nice and give it 8. (eight points to a michael bay film? whaaaaaa???!!?!)

8/10

Monday 23 February 2009

little nicky

arthur fonzarelli covered in bees. awesome.

7/10

final fantasy - the spirits within

they spent so long making this look good on a computer that they forgot to send it to a script editor. oh well, nice attempt. pixar still wins the crown though.

6/10

Sunday 22 February 2009

crouching tiger, hidden dragon


beautiful to look at - both the cinematography and the fights. classic chinese cinema in the 21st century.

8/10

dirty pair

long i have lamented the loss of originality on tv; how every single tv show is the s/lame formula:
bunch of people,
someone is voted off each week.

to make matters worse, some are even sharing the same "celebrity" judge, albeit with different wigs.

crikey, it took me a while to find a close-up shot of jane torvill's face. i think it's because i had my 'offensive material' filter switched on.

Saturday 21 February 2009

beethoven

if john candy was in it, it would've worked. but he's not.

3/10

návrat idiota


fixie riders: are they anti-establishment heroes with freedom in their hearts and fire in their thigh-muscles?
or are they just anti-social thugs who deserve the impending brain damage from splattering their head across the bonnet of a taxi?

my fixie dilemma: i love the look of the bikes, but i can't stand the culture that surrounds them.
typical. you discover something you really like, and it turns out its been adopted by dickheads.

oh fixie. why you taunt me so?

Friday 20 February 2009

eagle eye

piece of crap.

music & lyrics

ANNOUNCING: my new album



1 - Go to "wikipedia." Hit “random... Read More”
or click http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
The first random wikipedia article you get is the name of your band.

2 - Go to "Random quotations"
or click http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3
The last four or five words of the very last quote of the page is the title of your first album.

3 - Go to flickr and click on “explore the last seven days”
or click http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days
Third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover.

4 - Use photoshop or similar to put it all together.

5 - Post it to FaceBook with this text in the "caption" and TAG the friends you want to join in. (you can untag yourself if you don't want this photo up)

Thursday 19 February 2009

anchorman

my favourite will ferrell movie, but steve carrell steals the show. pretty much everyone has seen this, so i don't need to go into details.

if you haven't seen it. you suck.

8/10

the tattooist

...speaking of the world being fucking weird.

i don't think i need to say any more.

Wednesday 18 February 2009

charlie and the chocolate factory

the world is a very strange place. but not without a sick, dark and ironic sense of humour.

beverly hills cop III

just watched this again. i remember seeing it when i was little and hadn't developed a taste in movies. it was good then, but lordy me it sucks now.

1/10

Tuesday 17 February 2009

jesus walks

kanye west is a 'tard. sometimes he is so wrapped up in himself he forgets to brag about how awesome he is.

cars

just not as good as the other pixar works of genius.

5/10

Monday 16 February 2009

rumble in the bronx

usually i tend to avoid anything related to sport, for a few primary reasons. mainly my displeasure is based on the overpaid goits with no personality who don't deserve my attention.... and also it's boring.
if only there were more interesting people in sport. put an interesting/weird/dirty/funny/imbalanced/sexually-suspect person in front of anything and it vastly improves even the most boring of subjects.

america is rich with interesting/weird/dirty/funny/imbalanced/sexually-suspect people. like this crazy ice-hockey announcer who gets better the more you listen.

live free or die hard (die hard 4.0)

brilliant brilliant brilliant fun. apart from the terrible lip syncing in the final edit and a VERY silly scene with a fighter jet this film is a classic addition to the three before it. brilliant.

7/10

Sunday 15 February 2009

the goonies

it's like my entire childhood memories, all collected together in a perfect 90 minutes. there is not a time that i could ever get bored with watching this over and over again.

10/10

Saturday 14 February 2009

walk the line

no-one is quite sure what joaquin phoenix is up to right now... apparently given up acting to pursue a career in hip-hop, at least that's what he says.

you can't even tell from this thoroughly investigative interview on the david letterman show, but it's worth a little watch anyway:

catch & release

this got rubbish reviews but i really enjoyed it. kevin smith was great even though his humorous scenes seemed a little out of place.

7/10

Friday 13 February 2009

an inconvenient truth

stuff has got in the way of cycling lately. i've only done one day this week, and i have to say i'm missing it as one of the few joys in my average day. i'm pretty bored of snow and ice now, and i just want pleasant spring air so i can cycle everywhere.
it all hit home when i handed over £30 for a weeks worth of travel on the ever-more-sickening london underground, this morning. fuck, i hate the underground. it seems strange that the main transport network in our capital city is filled with two predominant features:
1: thousands of people intent on getting in my way.
2: control systems intent on preventing trains moving anywhere.


and we pay hundreds of pounds a year to use it. we're idiots.

maybe i'm just sick and tired of london.

garden state

by far one of my favourite films ever. zach braff proves he is more than J.D. natalie portman is tasty. ian holm pulls out a quiet and engaging performance. peter sarsgard is like a guitar solo. i could watch this over and over again, even if it was just for the shirt/wallpaper shot.

10/10

Thursday 12 February 2009

sideways

perhaps the best "bachelors' last stand" film in existence. paul giamatti's acting in this is absolutely perfect.

9/10

Wednesday 11 February 2009

king of wishful thinking

as a technician i am well aware how easy it is to make a mistake during a live show. usually they result in one of two responses, depending on the crowd:
1: a brief snicker from the audience, and we all move on with the show and forget about it.
2: the event organiser shits themself with anger and you never hear the end of it.

i love this story though, not only was the response a matter of hilarity, but the conversations leading up to it in the tech-booth were probably very much in the key of "what would be the best possible headline you'd like to see?"

little miss sunshine

sometimes a simple story and a group of actors hit the mark. little miss sunshine is almost flawless. heartwarming, energising, comforting, hilarious.

9/10

Tuesday 10 February 2009

snakes on a plane

this only needed the line "that's it, i'm sick to death of motherfucking snakes on this motherfucking plane!" to be absolute genius. and there's way more besides. great escapism in the form of a dodgy b-movie. always welcome.

8/10

Monday 9 February 2009

300

silly script, comedy love scene... but looks amazing and oh, such fun. basically a homo-erotic nipple-revealing series of manly poses and morale boosting one-liners. you could probably just play this to an audience instead of doing a motivational speech. if you were that sort of person.

7/10

Sunday 8 February 2009

part of your world

i finally got a chance to play in the snow! S.L.R. and i spent a couple of hours making this beautiful creature.. racing against time as it started to rain.

to my mind she is the second best thing to be made out of snow ever... after the arctic.

the painted veil

this only gets a star for the views of chinese countryside. other than that, a terrible performance from ed norton, a predictable story and a silly end scene.

1/10

Saturday 7 February 2009

dogma

my favourite kevin smith movie. among other things i'm a big fan of the theology beneath it.

as with any film involving religion this had an immediate and judgmental reaction from the conservative christians, bless 'em. what they should've done is watched the film and realised that it actually informs and argues theology in an easy to watch way. all their actions did was enforce the idea that has been forged for years by the general media, that all christians are nut-jobs with no sense of humour. i might start demonstrating outside of churches if they keep it up.. oh no, i've been to a few churches and they're actually alright.

anyway, that's all a bit off topic. this film is awesome.

9/10

Friday 6 February 2009

shaun of the dead

a new breed of comedy, proving that the brits are the best at it. this movie is delightful in so many ways, the way it feels completely home grown and independent, its playful behaviour, brilliant actors, zombies. it ignores a whole bunch of rules and is all the better for it. nick frost is a favourite of mine since he was mike in spaced and never fails to entertain in his own inimitable way, that makes you think you could be an actor too.

and lucy davies. yum.

i have a signed poster of this film, by simon pegg, nick frost, edgar wright, lucy davies and kate ashfield, from when i queued for 3 hours to meet them. it is one of the best things i own.

10/10

batman & robin

you may have heard that christian bale flew off the handle on the set of the new terminator movie a little while ago, when the director of photography walked on set during a scene. you may not have actually heard the rant though so here it is:



i like christian bale. he is funny. the DP probably deserved it.

also very funny was the way the beeb covered it this morning on the early morning breakfast show.

Thursday 5 February 2009

k-pax


my whole life, i've been waiting to see this in person.

spiderman 3

after spiderman 2 i wasn't expecting very much, and i wasn't disappointed. as in, i was... very disappointed indeed.

2/10

everything is illuminated

i've just subscribed to lovefilm, so i'm going to try and do a short movie review for every film i ever see.

expect one every day.

Wednesday 4 February 2009

lying in wait

what with this credit crunch and the rising unemployment figures, people are going to scrabble around for:
a) jobs.
b) unique reasons for why their employers should keep them.

however, nothing quite justifies this idea.

i particularly like "65kg" who could be the drummer from any number of generic indie-rock bands, and has worn his own clothes.

Tuesday 3 February 2009

proud

"what have you done today, to make you feel proud?" sings heather smalls of M People in that song. i fucking hate that song, and i fucking hate M People. which is why i can be seen vomiting at the back of most business management conferences when the inevitable motivational playlist starts:

simply the best - tina turner
we are the champions - queen
eye of the tiger - survivor
one vision - queen
proud - m people
hero - m people
moving on up - m people
...........fuck m fucking people

you may have laughed at the absurdity of david brent, but believe me (someone who has worked in the business conference industry for 8 years and seen in excess of 2000 events), david brent was entirely believable as a real person. seriously.

sometimes real life is far worse than your imagination could ever be.

anyway, perhaps the whole thing could be cured if they played this during morning coffees:
yeah. that'll work.

Monday 2 February 2009

touching the void

because of adverse weather conditions...
because of adverse weather conditions...
because of adverse weather conditions...
because of adverse weather conditions...
because of adverse weather conditions...

repeated over and over to me all morning, that phrase echoes through my head like an irritatingly catchy eurovision song. as i stand waiting in a queue to leave canary wharf station*, finally at my destination 3-and-while hours after leaving my home 10 miles away; i notice a hand written sign:

"because of adverse weather conditions the western exits at this station have been closed"


the snow is SO bad, they can't even open a door. god, i hope there isn't anything more serious around the corner. like a bit of wind or a member of staff getting the sniffles.


*yes. i had to queue to walk out.

the sorcerer's apprentice



at the time of that photo it was suggested that the next train was 9 minutes away. it must've been a spelling mistake as it took 45 minutes to arrive.

and as i quickly approached my 3rd hour of travel on a 50 minute journey, i couldn't save myself from the reality that - without exaggerating - it would have been quicker to walk; i couldn't help but smile at the irony and affirmation of shiteness that came from a platform announcement that went:
(and I quote)

apologies ladies and gentlemen, but it seems today we couldn't organise a piss-up in a brewery.


i hope he doesn't get reprimanded, he was the first member of the underground staff who had a firm grasp of what was going on.

bridge over the river kwai

as the world looked like this when i went to leave at 5.30 this morning i decided to shun the risk of 'death by idiot driver' and seek alternative transport to my bike. i may have been fine, but not being able to distinguish between curb and road seemed like a perilous obstacle.

i've neglected writing about the london underground very much on this blog for a few reasons, including the fact that it makes me so angry I could bust a blood vessel in my typing finger. also it strikes me as an unfair battle; when i'm faced with an opponent that has no line of defence, no positive statistics that it can quip back at me.

the london underground is basically a disaster.

for those of you who don't live in london or use the tube regularly, it's non-geographical map can appear illegible and scary. i've heard that. my greatest fear, though - is that anyone responsible for the running of 'london's premier transport system' might seek a change in career and end up in politics, and christ knows we're already disabled there.

but here i am, on a representation of a journey to work. it was a decision akin to which end of your body to put over the toilet bowl when you've got the nora virus, but i'm now down in the tube network... and it's going just about as well as expected, as I'm just approaching the end of my second hour of traveling. on a journey that normally takes 50 minutes.

but i should cut them some slack, it's not like we've had snow in this country ever before. oh no, wait a minute. my mistake. it happens nearly every year, doesn't it?

but still, every time the transport network reacts in the same way as a kitten the first time its owner throws it into a snow filled garden.


and to confirm my worst nightmares i've just been thrown out on to the street because of an 'emergency' at waterloo, and informed that there is no service. i'm guessing the 'emergency' is that the operators haven't really ever thought through the possibility that snow exists.

i wonder if it would've been quicker to start cycling in and come via a fractured limb at the nearest accident & emergency. my only current choice is to now walk as the buses and the DLR have also been canceled.

ah london. you bitch.

Sunday 1 February 2009