Archive for September, 2007

Scouting for Girls - Scouting for Girls

// September 30th, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

A chance encounter with an ad for this new British band might have been the luckiest moment I’ve had all year. Thoroughly brilliant as Sunday morning wake up music as well as Gym music, this is a truly brilliant album which constantly has my toe tapping - and constantly runs through my head even when iTunes isn’t playing it. Only pissed off that I’ve missed out on tickets for when they play the Cockpit in Leeds later this year. Stand out tracks for me are Heartbeat and She’s so Lovely - “always up for a laugh, she’s a pain in the arse”… indeed. 8.5/10

Superbad

// September 30th, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

Put quite simply Superbad is this generations “American Pie”, but about 200% better. Starting with 10 minutes of cock jokes sets the pace for the rest of the movie and three completely real kids go through one of their last days in high school. The cast are absolutely brilliant and I found myself noting similarities between the three “teen’s”, and also seeing in them people that I’ve known over the last 20 years. I didn’t stop laughing for more than 3 minutes throughout the entire screening and doubt I’ll see a funnier film all year. 9/10

Mr Woodcock

// September 30th, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

This just might be the funniest movie ever released… EVER. Yes, of course I’m taking the piss. It’s actual funny joke quotient sits at exactly 1. That’s 1 decent laugh for the entire 90 minutes of the piece. It was formulaic trash from start to finish, Seann William Scott, Billy Bob Thornton and Susan Sarandon are all utterly awful in their roles and the rest of the supporting cast do absolutely nothing to raise it above the level of pure awefullness. Do something more exciting today - get toothache. 1.5/10

Reaper (Episode 1)

// September 29th, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

“You sold my soul to the devil?” - that’s the premise behind the witty and quite frankly brilliant 40 minute beauty that is “Reaper”. Sam wakes up on his 21st birthday to discover that his folks traded his soul for his Fathers good health long before he was even born. The casting is great - from Sam’s best friend, to his love interest, to his mom and dad and everyone else too - noone put’s a foot wrong, and the devil is awesomely handled - I just know we’re going to see him get more evil than the downright creepy he managed to pull off in episode 1 as he crushes an unfortunate gentleman who “failed to honour the agreement” for his own soul. It’s got humour, it’s got drama, it’s got wonderful eye candy… up there with the best of all the new TV I’ve seen this last month and one I’ll definately be keeping an eye on. 8.5/10

Chuck (Pilot)

// September 29th, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

From the creator of the OC comes the promise of a spy series complete with humour and intelligence. Well, that’s the promise, though for my money what they actually delivered didn’t so much match against it. Which isn’t to say that I didn’t like what they delivered - just that it wasn’t really that intelligent, and although the lead is the same guy who in my opinion gave “Less than Perfect” almost 50% of it’s laughs - Chuck just didn’t bring in the laughs for me in the first episode. What it did do however was make me chuckle, and also set up the main characters really quite well - so much so that I’m actually thinking that from episode 2 we might start to see the real laughs, and the real intelligence that was sadly not quite there in this pilot viewing. I liked it a lot, just stacked up against Journeyman and Reaper - it’s the bottom of my viewing list for next week. 7/10

Heroes (Book 2 - Chapter 1)

// September 29th, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

Having been downright upset with the promise and then letdown of the first season of Heroes I’ve decided to give it one more chance - not least because of the promise of a season without Peter Petrelli, and also because I don’t want them 2 days I spent watching the first season be for nothing. So, the first episode of the new season introduced a couple of new “heroes” to the mix - a crazy south American woman who kills people by making their eyes bleed, a dim witted student lad with the ability to fly (yawn) and also a hooded murderous type who seems to be able to withstand a fall. Of course, some of the old crowd are back too - Matt Parkman getting his detective badge, Suresh and Claire’s Dad out to “bring down the company”, Claire being harassed by previously mentioned flying dim witted student, and Nathan Petrelli, complete with “homeless man beard” - who must have dropped his brother to escape the blast - not very together to the end if you ask me. Finally, Hiro is still back in the past and finding out first hand about that sword he stole in season 1. All in all the episode had a nice fast pace to it - getting us all (those who loved, and those who didn’t quite alike) abreast of what’s happened in the 4 months since Peter died. Except well, he didn’t. As the last 2 minutes see a return for amateur acting skilled Peter Petrelli - though with a severe case of amnesia, and glowy energy emitting hand powers. Let’s hope the lack of memory has freed some space for “not being a plank when acting” hero powers. 6/10

Journeyman (Pilot)

// September 29th, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

The “Silent and strong” one from Rome comes to a cross between Cold Case and Quantum Leap (with a little bit of Dawsons Creek in their for the musical inspiration). Journeyman starts slowly and quickly ramps up the speed with a great storyline, and also a hell of a lot of back story too. Everyone plays their roles brilliantly, from the hurt of the jilted brother to the innocence of the eager son. The only thing that stops me from absolutely loving Journeyman is the fact that it seems to be Quantum Leap - and when that series was so perfect to start with it seems silly that someone else would try to go back there. It is however only the first episode and Sarah McLaughlin’s “Building a mystery” has never been so apt as when Dan “Journeymans” dead ex-lover turns up in the past to warn him not to change anything. Can’t wait for the next installment to see if it lives up to the first. 8.5/10

BBC iPlayer

// September 7th, 2007 // 1 Comment » // Reviews

So, millions of tax payer pounds later and the open source nerd squad railing against it and I looked at it and was completely underwhelmed. To be fair it’s not just the linux-kids who are pissed off - I run Window Vista and can’t get the thing running without faking my user agent string. However, these operational things are small when compared to the fact that the BBC can’t manage to get their content onto the thing. Having purposefully decided that I was able to miss a couple of programmes because they were on iPlayer I have been unbelievably pissed off to find that “However, due to unforeseen technical difficulties, a small percentage of the content listed is unavailable to download;” is a very valid argument for the BBC pissing my tax payer pounds up the wall, and not delivering on their promise to give me BBC content online. Either make it work or shelve the fucking project - half arsed isn’t useful to me. 3/10

Hallam Foe

// September 1st, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

Having only found out about this movie about 10 days ago, with it’s large yellow bill boards proclaiming it to be the best movie ever made, I was a bit sceptical and didn’t really expect too much. Billy Elliot 2 or something. It is however completely magical. Jamie Bell is amazingly believable as troubled Hallam and plays the part wonderfully, supported by no-one who puts a foot wrong - every single member of the cast playing their role to perfection. It has moments that made me cringe, moments that made me smile, moments that made me sad - and not a single moment where I regretted the 6.25 to get into the cinema. British Cinematic Perfection. 9/10

1408

// September 1st, 2007 // No Comments » // Reviews

No doubt John Cussack is brilliant - this is just a given. He’s brilliant after all, and his part in 1408 is no different, as pretty much the only person in it for well over 50% of the movie he really needs to though. I would love to say that I loved 1408 - however, I’d just as much like to say that I hated 1408. It was just a bit … well, strange. There are some plain moments of genius, and some parts that were so well delivered - especially the second death of the daughter. But also, it was kinda dull, kinda predictable, and kinda everything that I expected it to be. I wanted something DIFFERENT and blowing of the mind. Before going in someone had remarked that it had been compared to “The Shining” - and honestly I did not take that away from the movie. It’s good - it’s just not great. Which is a shame as I’ve been looking forward to it since I saw the trailer last year. 7/10