Movie Review: Prometheus

The lukewarm reviews did Prometheus a favour. They helped puncture the biggest bubble of hype to surround any movie in recent memory. It's been impossible to take a breath over the last few weeks without someone trying to ram Prometheus down your throat. Complete three minute TV ad breaks devoted to one monster trailer. "Special cinema featurettes" interviewing the entire crew, right down to the big stone head's cleaning lady. You couldn't go out in the street without being accosted by Ridley Scott, desperate to tell you about his "creation myth" and how "this was much more than just an Alien prequel".

Like many people, I'm wary of too much hype. When Hollywood throws so much money at a film before it opens (and refuses critics access till the very last second), I start to smell turkey. And then, late last week... I started to hear the reviews. Ho-hum three starrers that complained of a poor script, a lack of suspense, anticlimax and 'meh'. One former colleague, possibly the world's biggest Alien fan, whose excitement over this movie has been bubbling over for months, broke down in soppy wet tears on Facebook and blew his brains out with a bicycle pump.

As I said at the top, all this did Prometheus a huge favour. My expectations weren't too high... and so...

I liked it.

Go in expecting another Aliens movie and you'll probably be disappointed. Because that's not what's on offer here: and that's a good thing. Indeed, the closing moneyshot seems almost shoed in to make the obligatory connection to the franchise Scott gave messy birth to back in 1979. This is a film that stands fine on its own, and may even have benefited from not being tied to the movies that went before. It has a fascinating mythology all its own, a great cast (Fassbender steals it once again) and some truly stunning visuals (note: I did not watch this film in 3D, and can only imagine what a mess that pointless "technology" would have made of many of the key moments).

Don't get me wrong, Prometheus is by no means perfect. There are some pretty huge plotholes and the last half hour feels rushed. Guy Pearce, while excellent, seems a strange choice for a role that could just as easily been filled by an older actor minus the liver-spotted war paint. But these are quibbles; I didn't have any major problems with the script, the mystery kept me engrossed, and Noomi Rapace proves a great choice for the lead, more than just a girl with a dragon tattoo... and much more than just a Ripley substitute.

It's all left wide open for a sequel, obviously, yet if they do go down that route they'll need to make damned sure not to revert to type. There are many questions still to be answered here, but the temptation to run back down a dimly lit corridor towards another crowd pleasing humans versus aliens shoot-out must be avoided at all costs.

Book Review: Before I Go To Sleep by S.J. Watson

Every morning, Christine wakes up with no memory of the last 20 years of her life. Her husband Ben has to tell her who she is, where she is, what happened to her and why she can't remember. To help her rebuild her shattered memory, Christine is working with a mysterious doctor who has encouraged her to keep a journal every day of what she (re)discovers about her past. Ben knows nothing about this doctor. Why doesn't Christine trust her husband enough to tell him? Because her journal warns her not to. Meanwhile what happened to Christine's son, Adam... a child she doesn't even remember, despite an intrinsic certainty that she once was a mother? And where is her best friend, Claire? Did she really desert Christine in her time of greatest need?

Fans of Memento will already be hooked. Although the similarities to Christopher Nolan's breakthrough movie are marked, the plot of Before I Go To Sleep is more domestic drama than out-and-out thriller. It's certainly a page-turner though and engenders a similar sense of paranoia as we (Christine & the reader) struggle to work out whodunit... and just what was done. And I'm pleased to say that although I had my suspicions about the twist, the solution was not at all what I'd expected.

Movie Review: The Descendants

There were a lot of reasons I wanted to see The Descendants. I'm a big fan of director Alexander Payne's previous movies: Sideways, About Schmidt and Election. I enjoy George Clooney's laconic Cary Grant shtick and was intrigued by the awards buzz surrounding his latest performance. And the film's set in Hawaii, so if nothing else we could be sure it'd be nice to look at.

As with all Payne's prominent work, The Descendants is a leisurely, spacious film that allows much time for subtle characterisation and quietly observed comedy. I'd say it probably made me laugh less than any of the films listed above, but then I did make the mistake of popping to the loo during what Louise later informed me had been the funniest scene. That said, it did make me smile a lot and Clooney was charming and sympathetic as ever. Was it his best role? No, he was far better in O, Brother Where Art Thou? where he actually got to do some proper acting, rather than just playing himself. But it's his time, there's a lot of good will towards him, and there are far worse movie stars getting far more recognition, so I don't begrudge him the plaudits. Some attention must however be given to his kids, played by Shailene Woodley and Amara Miller, both of whom inhabit their complex roles with ease, and the dumb teenage layabout Sid (Nick Krause), who gets dragged along on their adventures and ultimately proves to be there for more than just clichéd comic relief. As for Hawaii, I was impressed by how Payne showed us a different side of the islands than we usually get from Hollywood. Still beautiful, but a little more rainy and windswept with random chickens scattering the streets and fallen leaves filling the swimming pools. It made me want to visit even more.

If you enjoyed Payne's previous films, you'll enjoy The Descendants. Arguably, it's not his best work, but it's another fine addition to the cv for both him and Clooney. And there's a Beau Bridges cameo too, looking almost more dudelike than even his brother could manage.

Book Review - The Good, The Bad and The Multiplex by Mark Kermode

"All you really need to know about The Oscars is that they're the awards that didn't give a Best Picture gong to Citizen Kane, but did give one to Driving Miss Daisy. Just think about that for a moment and try to imagine a world in which Driving Miss Daisy really was the best film you were going to see all year. Be honest. You'd throw yourself off a bridge, wouldn't you?"

As I said when I reviewed his last book, It's Only A Movie, I rarely disagree with Mark Kermode when it comes to cinema. Films, yes, occasionally we quibble over individual movies. Even then, I can usually see his point (even if I disagree). But when it comes to his thoughts on cinema itself, Mark Kermode is my soul brother.

I don't think critics should do the job of watching movies for you. I don't even think they should do the job of telling you which movies to watch. Or what you should think about them. No, I think critics should do the job of watching all the movies and then telling you what they think in a way which is honest, engaging, erudite and (if you're lucky) entertaining.

Beyond that, you're on your own.

His latest book tackles just What's Wrong With Modern Cinema. And I nodded my head so much, Louise thought I'd developed a twitch.

From major problems with the movie-going experience itself (the frustrations of online ticket buying, badly framed films and why popcorn is wrong) to the way Hollywood is screwing up and dumbing down the end product (like me, Kermode has a serious loathing of 3D - though he does point out that the Nazis were big fans) to the thorny question of "What are film critics for anyway?", this book is always entertaining, often hilarious and occasionally infuriating. I shared his frustration and pain - particularly when he was arguing with a pompous cinema "manager" who obviously had little interest in how films were projected onto the screen. Together, we mourned the death of the professional projectionist and looked back fondly on a world where ushers did more than just tear your ticket stub. And when he compares the modern cinema going experience to Westworld minus Yul Brynner... well, I had to shudder.

In the wake of Avatar's bum-numbing stereoscopic success, every half-witted Hollywood producer without an original thought in their coke-addled heads decided that 3D was a cash cow and all future products must be forced to conform to this glutinous economic paradigm forthwith. Never mind the fact that (James) Cameron had spent years gazing at his own navel trying to figure out how to make a game-changing movie in a medium which no one had liked for almost a century. Say what you like about Avatar (that it's infantile, overlong, shamelessly derivative, wildly patronising, and laughably lacking in humour from start to finish - which it is), at least its creator believed in the technological innovations apparently required to bring it to the screen. Never mind that the film looks a million times better in 2D (clearer, sharper, brighter) or that Pandora is a far more immersive world when not viewed through the alienating annoyance of polarised lenses that make everything seem dark, dingy and dismally diminutive. At least Cameron thought he was doing the right thing - like Tony Blair deciding to invade Iraq, only with less tragic results.

2011 - Books of the Year

The Best of 2010 Countdown continues with the best books I've read this year. No attempts to categorise them into books that were published in 2010 or not... instead, a short countdown of my favourite non-fiction reads before we get onto the main event.

Click the links to read my full reviews. If you can be bothered.

My Top Five Non-Fiction Books of 2010

5. Adventures On The High Teas - Stuart Maconie

4. Sex, Drugs & Cocoa Puffs - Chuck Klosterman

3. The Progressive Patriot - Billy Bragg

2. Good Morning Nantwich - Phil Jupitus

1. How I Escaped My Certain Fate - Stewart Lee

My Top Ten Fiction Books of 2011

10. World War Z - Max Brooks

9. Furnace - Muriel Gray

8. Room - Emma Donoghue

7. Started Early, Took My Dog - Kate Atkinson

6. The Hollow Man - John Dickson Carr

5. The Passage - Justin Cronin

4. Full Dark, No Stars - Stephen King

3. Seeing Stars - Simon Armitage

2. Child 44 - Tom Rob Smith

1. The Crimson Petal And The White - Michel Faber

It was a difficult list to judge this year, largely due to a couple of my favourite books suffering from huge flaws in their final acts. Justin Cronin's The Passage is prime example - in many ways, it's the most engrossing novel I've read this year... but it just doesn't know when to end. Child 44 was not so all-consuming, yet it was far more balanced and satisfying on conclusion. The top prize had to go to Michel Faber though, combining a cracking genre plot (a genre I'm usually not that interested in) with beautiful, witty and imaginative prose. The TV adaptation was fun, but not a patch on the source material.

What's the best book you read this year?

Book Review: World War Z by Max Brooks

Subtitled 'An Oral History of the Zombie War', Max Brooks' novel offers a unique perspective - or many different perspectives - on what is becoming a well told tale. While zombie holocausts are ten a penny these days, Brooks gives us something I hadn't seen before: the global picture. There are no recurring characters here (except the unseen narrator), just a series of interviews which tell the story of a terrifying zombie plague from first bite to final (?) victory. From China to Texas, Finland to South Korea, India to Sydney, Barbados to the Federated States of Micronesia, we see a truly worldwide catastrophe, from the point of view of arrogant soldiers, terrified civilians, vain movie directors, failing politicians and horrified relief workers. It's tirelessly researched with clever insights into warfare, science, technology and society as a whole, though Brooks also manages to find time for moments of breathtaking excitement, terror and even the odd laugh. It doesn't take you on the same kind of emotional journey as The Passage, yet it's more plausible and knows when to call it a day. A fascinating novel - though God only knows how Brad Pitt thinks he's going to turn it into a movie...

I met one gentleman on a coastal ferry from Portland to Seattle. He had worked in the licensing department for an advertising agency, specifically in charge of procuring the rights to classic rock songs for television commercials. Now he was a chimney sweep. Given that most homes in Seattle had lost their central heating and the winters were now longer and colder, he was seldom idle. "I help keep my neighbours warm," he said proudly. I know it sounds a little Norman Rockwell, but I hear stories like that all the time.

Movie Review: Another Earth

I knew very little about Another Earth as I walked into the cinema, only that it was a low budget movie about the discovery of an identical earth in orbit around our own. I was intrigued enough to give it a go, and I'm glad I did. Hidden away, with no stars and a limited release, this proved to be one of the year's most engrossing pictures.

As with all the best sci fi, the big ideas here take a back seat to the characters. Essentially this is a story about two people: a reckless young student (Brit Marling) with a promising career ahead of her and a successful composer and family man (Lost bit-parter William Mapother, cursed forever to be known as as "Tom Cruise's cousin", proving himself here to a far more interesting actor). Both their lives are changed on the night the second earth appears in the sky, and what follows is the story of how they rebuild themselves while a terrible secret lurks behind their every encounter. It's a doomed love story, beautifully observed, with strong performances from both leads. The film, written by Marling and director Mike Cahill, grips from the start and leads to an enigmatic, emotional and hugely satisfying conclusion. If you get a chance to catch it on the big screen, grab it.

Even More Sex & Violence

Many thanks to Andy Oliver over at Broken Frontier for helping promote my new comic, TOO MUCH SEX & VIOLENCE. I've never been interviewed before... it makes me feel like a proper writer - at last!

Read the Broken Frontier interview here.

Meanwhile, feedback and reviews on the first issue continue to pour in... here's another selection of opinions...

"If you are a fan of League of Gentlemen, then Too Much Sex & Violence is the comic for you. A gloriously depraved and quirky selection of vignettes all settled around the 'not so quiet' seaside town of Fathomsby. Rol Hirst writes and corrals the assorted artists together to make this one of the more interesting reads this year."

(Gary Erskine: artist, Hellblazer, The Filth, Dan Dare.)

"Reminds me of Gary Spencer Millidge's Strangehaven on a bad drug trip! If you like the dark humour of the League of Gentlemen then you'll like this comic!" (Selina Lock: writer/editor, The Girly Comic.)

"Hail to Fathomsby!" (James Lindsay: writer, filmmaker, A Pessimist Darkly.)

"...superbly paced and dramatically rendered... you can never have to much of a good thing, and Too Much Sex & Violence is a very good thing." (Dan Powell: award-winning writer.:)

"...delectably macabre..." Andy Oliver: writer/editor, Broken Frontier.

"...beautifully overdone stuff." Al Ewing: writer, Travelling Man.

"There are some great lines in it too... It made me chuckle anyway." Michael Barnes aka El Blondino, artist.

And if you missed the first batch of reviews, click here.

If you've not yet got enough Sex & Violence in your life... get yourself a copy today.

Too Much Sex & Violence... It's A Hit!

Welcome to the northern seaside town of Fathomsby; home to retired super-heroes, monster DJs, mutant prostitutes, pier-owning gangsters, disgruntled policemen and a woman who knows exactly what you're thinking about, whenever you're thinking about...S-E-X.

The reviews are in and the first issue of my new comic, TOO MUCH SEX & VIOLENCE, is a hit! Not an unqualified hit, but I expected a few rough waters because of the comic's ever-changing roster of artists, its at-times dubious subject matter, and the fact that first issues (story set-ups) are a notoriously difficult sell. Still, I think enough people are intrigued by #1 to come back for #2... and that's where we really blow the doors off.

Here's some of the comments I've had so far...

"This may be a freakshow, but it’s a freakshow you can’t take your eyes off... one of those first issues of a series that you finish and immediately want to reread, just to make sure you got everything." (Richard Bruton: writer, Forbidden Planet International.)

"A most enjoyable read... reminded me of Worthing, nicely weird and gripping."

(Glyn Dillon: artist, Deadline; Shade, The Changing Man)

"I quickly forgot I was reading a comic. I was simply reading something well written and expertly put together - there's a lot of talent contained within these 28 pages."

(Martin Pond: writer, Dark Steps)

"...a really engaging and unusual first issue..." (Nicolas Papaconstantinou: writer, Monkey On My Back)

"...extreme shocking for shocks sake is not the purpose of this book but there is at least one eyeball shooting out of its socket to keep it interesting." (Lee Sargent: artist, Quit Your Day Job)

TOO MUCH SEX & VIOLENCE #1 is available to buy for just £2.50 (printed) or £0.99 (pdf download) from this place here. Go buy it now. Or tell your friends to. Then write about it all over the interweb. Go on, I insist.

Movie Review: Contagion

For years, I didn't like Gwyneth Paltrow very much. I found her whiny. 'Whiny, whiny, whiny boots of leather', I used to sing whenever she whined her way onto my cinema screen. Followed by a chorus of '6ix' by the Lemonheads, based on her unfortunate fate in the movie Se7en, notable for its refrain, "Here comes Gwyneth's head in a box". I was thrown out of many a Gwyneth Paltrow film for doing this, but it was worth it.

Yet in recent years, particularly following her standout performances in Iron Man and Country Strong, I've grown a grudging appreciation of Gwyneth's talents. Thank god then for Steven Soderberg, here in the nick of time to confirm what a skanky, disease ridden strumpet Chris Martin's missus really is. If you don't like Gwyneth, that's one damn good reason to watch Contagion right there. Nasty things do happen to her.

Nasty things happening to famous, pretty people is basically what Contagion is all about. But while I could happily sit through Gwyneth foaming at the mouth, I had less time for the unfortunate fates of Kate Winslet and Marion Cotillard. The women do most of the suffering in Soderberg's H1N1 disaster movie while the blokes do most of the whining. Matt Damon's most upset about losing his wife and child to the virus, though the worst his own symptoms get are a fat face and a bad mullet. Meanwhile, Lawrence Fishburne thinks he's still in CSI and Jude Law plays cinema's most hateful nerd, giving a bad name to bloggers everywhere. When Elliot Gould tells him "blogging's not journalism - it's just graffiti with punctuation", I almost considered hanging up my keyboard. Thank god then for Jennifer Ehle, not just the film's one true hero but also it's only brief moment of sex appeal. Even when the world's going to hell in a hand basket, it's good to know our top scientists still wear hold-up stockings.

I didn't enjoy Contagion as much as the critics. It was a competent, plausible, at times unnerving thriller that followed exactly the path you'd expect with few surprises. If you've seen Outbreak, you know exactly what's coming. That the human race is almost doomed by a pig, a bat and Gwyneth Paltrow was curiously satisfying to the misanthrope in me... but my hypochondriac side hated watching it in a packed cinema with people coughing and spluttering all around. I'd suggest watching it from inside a Jacko-style isolation tent... or the comfort of your own home. Don't talk to anyone. Don't touch anyone. Especially Gwyneth.

Movie Review - Drive

Imagine you're listening to a piece of classical music performed by a string quartet. The music is slow and leisurely. There's rarely more than one instrument playing at a time and long moments of silence punctuate the pianissimo. You're enjoying this music. It's warm, comforting, hypnotic. You could listen to it all day.

And then, from nowhere, THE TRUMPETS burst in. An electric guitar SHRIEKS power chords. A drummer goes CHAOTIC. The bagpipes BLAST. It's AWFUL. SHOCKING. BRUTAL. But that's the point.

Drive is a very strange movie. It stars Ryan Gosling, a genetic hybrid of Paul Newman and Steve McQueen, as a cool, detached getaway driver cum mechanic who begins a shy, reserved relationship with his neighbour, Carey Mulligan. The opening scene is a tense car chase (or non-chase) that sets you up for more of the same, then wrongfoots the audience by steering them into a romantic cul de sac. When Mulligan's ex turns up, you suspect things are going to go bad for our hero: just how bad you'll never guess.

Drive is a movie where bad people do bad things, and good people do worse. It has moments of horrific violence which might have passed unnoticed in an action movie yet stand out like the aforementioned bagpipes here. It has Christina Hendricks, like you've never seen her before. It has a magnetic performance from Mulligan and a mumbling intensity from Gosling that recalls Brando at his white-vested best. It has a weird soundtrack made up of 80s synth bands. It feels like it could be happening right now or any time in the last five decades. It might be one of the best films I've seen this year... but I'm still not sure I actually enjoyed it.

Movie Review - Cowboys & Aliens

Hey - you like westerns, right?

How about sci-fi films?

Yeah?

What about Daniel Craig? Harrison Ford? Thirteen from House? Sam Rockwell? The Kurgan? Walton freaking Goggins?

Imagine them all in the same movie - wouldn't that be incredible?

Erm...

I had high hopes for Cowboys & Aliens, but it just didn't work. The two genres mixed like oil and water, with the western floating about on top only to be spoiled every time an unimaginative CGI alien flashed its jaws across the surface.

There are some fine actors at work here, struggling with a humourless script that attempts to cram in as many cliches from the two genres as possible. The plot takes some ridiculous leaps that would stretch credibility even if this were pure sci-fi. In A western, they just seem crass. The opening half hour is the best, but we'd seen virtually that whole story sequence already in the trailer. There were no surprises to be had and precious little fun. I grew increasingly fidgety towards the end, and that's the worst crime of all for a film featuring both Cowboys and Aliens. No way should I have been bored.

Dull.

Movie Review - The Skin I Live In

Rol's first rule about promoting movies with plots that hinge on a huge, monkey frightening twist: don't. Don't mention the twist at all. Don't let reviewers mention the twist at all. Shoot every audience member as soon as they've watched the film so they don't tell anyone else about the twist. This is the only way your movie will ever be enjoyed as you intended it.

There's nothing worse than going into a movie knowing there's a twist coming. You spend half the film looking under your seat, round the back of the projector, under the lead actor's wig... anywhere the twist might be hidden. Chances are you'll stumble across it before the big reveal because twists only really shock if you don't know they're coming.

The frustrating thing about The Skin I Live In is that, although I knew there was a twist coming, and I was scouring the cinema to find it... I don't think I'd have rumbled it quite so soon if Pedro Almodovar hadn't helped me along. There's a clunking great clue in his choice of a specific narrative device about halfway through the movie that points a big fat finger at the twist and goes "hey, senors and senoritas, check THEESE out!" which kind of ruined the surprise for me. I don't think device in question was necessary and I think the movie would have worked much better without it... but other than that, The Skin I Live In is a stylish and engrossing piece of film-making.

Re-uniting with the director who made him famous, Antonio Banderas gives his strongest performance in years as a cool and Clooney-esque plastic surgeon with a dark secret locked up in his spare bedroom: Elena Anaya, an actress so impossibly beautiful you think she must have been poured from a mould herself. But did Banderas create this vision of loveliness out of spare parts lying round his plastic surgery clinic? How much does she resemble his long deceased wife? And why is he keeping her prisoner? To say anything else would spoil the surprise more than Almodovar himself seems willing to do, but I guarantee you'll have fun learning the answers.

Oh, and you know you're watching a Pedro Almodovar film when a man turns up in a tiger costume for no reason at all. Anywhere else, this might seem odd...

Music I'm Listening To This Week

I was intrigued by the promo email for the debut single by new American band Dreamers of the Ghetto because it screamed BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN all over my inbox. These PR people, they know how to get my attention. Lead singer Luke James certainly has a classic hoarse power rock voice, but that's where the Springsteen comparison ends for me. Not to say I didn't enjoy it, Tether builds like a bastard and must sound fantastic live - all seven and a half minutes of it. Plus, if you like songs about space travel - or getting spaced out in general, I seriously recommend you press play now...



The band's debut album, Enemy/Lover,is released October 4th.

Another American band who owe a sizable debt to the Boss are The Airborne Toxic Event. Their second album, All At Once,received a somewhat low-key release earlier this year. I caught them live while they were touring their first and I felt certain they were on their way up so I'm surprised there hasn't been more fanfare for the follow-up. I guess it's not a great time to be selling literate guitar music, not in the UK music market anyway. Pity.



One British band hoping to buck that sad trend are Littlehampton's The Indicators who are bringing back the spirit of punk - and channeling Jilted John if their debut single is anything to go by. A sorry tale of the dire consequences of eating too many fast food £1.99 meal deals... we've all been there.

Went to the Wimpy, had a 1-99, but it didn't fill me up...

I heard this song on Lamacq last week but I'm having a devil of a job finding out if or when the band have a album out. I'll keep trying to find out.



Finally, this week's golden oldie comes from January of 1977 when it made the heights of #31 in the UK singles chart. It's still a blinder, a lyrically intriguing story in the vein of Billy Joel or Randy Newman. As opening lyrics go, these take some beating...

On a morning from a Bogart movie
In a country where they turn back time
You go strolling through the crowd like Peter Lorre
Contemplating a crime

Movie Review - The Inbetweeners

A lot of movie comedies leave me cold. I find I enjoy the performances but wish the script could be sharper to match. The worst offender is often big screen adaptations of successful TV sitcoms. What works well in tight 30 minute slices often feels stretched and bloated to fill 2 hours. So I went into The Inbetweeners movie expecting the chuckles to be as sparse as the sexual conquests. Thankfully, the lads blew my expectations. This is one funny film... as long as The Inbetweeners is your kind of funny.

Like the TV show that spawned it, The Inbetweeners is immature, indecent, icky and idiotic. Much has been written about why the adventures of four sexist and sexually inept Sixth Formers should have captured the nation's heart so, but the reasons are obvious. We all knew lads like this at school - hell, many of us were lads like this at school... and probably still wish we could be. There's the pedantic geek (guilty), the lovestruck sap, the inveterate bullshitter and the big dumb oaf with a heart of gold. We all love a loser - because that's how most of us felt in high school. But by the time we hit the Sixth Form, we'd usually found our niche - and mates who'd stay with us forever.

Much of the Inbetweeners humour is near-the-knuckle or downright crude, but it's rarely cruel. It kicks political correctness in the goolies yet never feels offensive. Largely that's because our four straight white male heroes are buffoons, so we're laughing at their attitudes and opinions as much as their antics. And for all their gross-out sex-talk and objectification of women, the girls they encounter are usually smarter, sassier and cooler than any of the Inbetweeners could ever hope to be.

I never went on an 18-30 holiday with my mates, but this film is exactly how I'd imagine such an experience. (People I know who did say it's spot on.) It's hideous... yet also heartwarming. These are the very best of times, and the worst, and The Inbetweeners movie captures that sense of joyful camaraderie you'll either fondly recall from your schooldays... or wish wholeheartedly you could have experienced. Sprinkle liberally with graphic jokes about masturbation, deviation, regurgitation and defecation - plus lashings of humiliation - and it's an experience you'll remember for the rest of your life.

My only real complaint was that we didn't get more of Head of Sixth Form Mr. Gilbert. Greg Davies' opening speech must echo the unspoken thoughts of teachers across the land with its frank "I never liked any of you" message. Fortunately this isn't the very last we see of Mr. Gilbert... but maybe he could get his own spin off show now?

Music I'm Listening To This Week

I should be forgiven for thinking that Stornoway were a new band from Scotland - not just from their name, or the fact that they sound a little like Belle & Sebastian (meets Mumford & Sons), but also because it was my old Glaswegian music blogger mate JC, The Vinyl Villain,who first brought them to my attention.

Turns out though they're actually from Oxford - home to Radiohead, Supergrass and my recent obsession. Wherever they hail from, they make a glorious summery sound on this single, and their album Beachcomber's Windowsillhas shot to the top of my Must Buy When I Have Some Money list.



A record I bought much earlier this year (when I had more money!) was the not-at-all-difficult second album from Fleet Foxes. Unlike many of the critics, their debut took a long time to grow on me, and only really made its mark with the release of the "bonus tracks" edition featuring the sublime Mykonos.

Helplessness Bluesowes an even greater debt to Simon & Garfunkel than its predecessor and includes a couple of lyrical moments that sneak up and mug you with their beauty, notably the title track's bridging refrain...

If I had an orchard,

I'd work till I'm raw
If I had an orchard,
I'd work till I'm sore

Maybe it's not grammatically ideal (and the linguistic pedant in me wants to quibble with their clumsy repetition of 'unique' in the same song's opening stanza), but it's a sentiment I think we can all get behind.

However, the Fleet Foxes song that's wedged itself in my head this week is this one, with its timely commentary on the education funding debate...

The borrowers debt is the only regret of my youth



Mentioning Simon & Garfunkel reminds me of the long-awaited new long-player from Paul Simon, So Beautiful Or So What.Now in his 70th year, Simon was seen recently grouching on the Glastonbury sofa that his voice isn't what it used to be. Well, neither are my ears, Paul - but I'm damned if I can hear any kind of deterioration from the voice I fell in love with as a teenager (when you'd already been using it for 25+ years).

The best thing about the new Paul Simon album is that he's written a song about Jay-Z (I can't wait for Jay-Z's riposte... "I'm Wearing Diamonds From The Soles Of Paul Simon's Shoes"?) but that's not the one I've chosen to feature here. No further explanation should be necessary...



I stumbled across this next track during a completely random youtube search. If you're a fan of the deep south soundtrack of the Coen Brothers movie O Brother, Where Art Thou? then I think you'll dig The Civil Wars too. Barton Hollowcomes from the album of the same name.



This week's music has been all very folky and melodious so let's finish with something completely different... and so wrong it hurts. A greasy, spotty, belching chunk of shamelessly juvenile, spectacularly un-pc, nerd-rap-rock from the late 90s. Ladies and gentlemen, it's The Bloodhound Gang... from the album, ahem, Hooray For Boobies.

You and me, baby, ain't nothing but mammals

So let's do it like they do it on the Discovery Channel...

Movie Review - Super 8

I'm late reviewing Super 8, so I have little time left to convince you to go see the best film of the summer before it departs our multiplexes... but if you're one of those people who believes "they don't make 'em like they used to when I was a kid" and you were a kid back in the 1980s, you really are missing a treat.

JJ Abrams has recaptured the spirit of movies like The Goonies, Back To The Future, ET and Gremlins in this heartwarming monster movie that, yes, may veer ever so slightly off the tracks into schmaltz (particularly with its 'Our Two Dads' subplot) but ends up no worse for that. Because, you know what? Those films we love from the 80s came with a fair slice of schmaltz too... but they also made you care. And I cared about this film more than I have any other movie of the summer.

Watching Super 8, I yearned for my youth. Abrams could easily have told this story in the present day, but it wouldn't have had half as much charm. I live a big chunk of my life on the internet, yet still I found myself longing for simpler days when the most complex bit of tech in a teenager's bedroom was a handheld Pac Man, when kids made models and played vinyl records and argued with their siblings over what to watch on the only TV in the house. Rose-tinted nostalgia? Perhaps... I do remember the first time I saw Back To The Future back in 1985 thinking how much better it would have been to grow up in the 50s with Marty McFly's parents... Hollywood only ever reminds us of the good times in movies like this... but is that really such a bad thing?

I couldn't help but sympathise with the Sheriff Pruitt when he told a youth with a clunky cassette Walkman... "kids walking round with their own stereos is the last thing we need - it's a slippery slope!"

Music I'm Listening To This Week

Five more songs I can't get out of my head (or off my music player)...

8in8 is a musical collaboration between Amanda Palmer, Ben Folds, Damian Kulash and Neil Gaiman. Yes. Musical. Neil Gaiman. Calm down, granny.

I downloaded this record some weeks ago from Amanda Palmer's website (where it's available for a minimum price of just $1) because I'm a huge fan of both Palmer and Folds, both of whom can do no wrong in my eyes... well, apart from marrying Neil Gaiman. I really wish Ben Folds hadn't done that.

Anyway, I've been happily enjoying it without actually realising that the final track is spoken by the God of All Stories About Stories About Stories himself. Who knew he sounded so much like a cross between Tom Lehrer and Noel Coward? The track is called The Problem With Saints... and bloody hell, it's annoyingly good. My Neil Gaiman rehabilitation continues...

Fortunately it's not my favourite track on the record. I wouldn't have been able to live that down. No, my favourite track (though to be fair, all six are excellent) is this... a duet about the failure of permissive parenting, by Amanda and Ben...



Oh, and the 8in8 mini-album is called Nighty Night, presumably in tribute to Julia Davis. That's got to be worth 61p (at today's exchange rate) of anybody's money.

Skint & Demoralised...? Well, yes, I am. But am I downhearted? No, because I've just discovered my New Favourite Band (this week's model) - and they're from just down the road in Wakefield.

I missed out on Skint & Demoralised first time round. So did a lot of people, it seems, despite their debut album Love, And Other Catastrophesbeing on a major label. Listening to songwriter Matt Abbott on 6Music earlier in the week I heard him explain how the band went from heroes to zeroes in the space of two months back in 2009, leaving them with perhaps the most appropriate stage name in pop. Now they're back, with This Sporting Lifeon their own indie label, and ironically drawing more attention than ever. It's a fickle mistress, the music business.

Originally a performance poet, Abbott writes classic observational indie lyrics that'll remind you of everyone from Morrisey to Ian Dury to Mike Skinner to Frank Turner. Yes, he's that good. Further evidence can be found on his ode to the great British pub...

Speaking of Frank Turner, I've yet to grow tired of his latest record, England Keep My Bones- it could well turn out to be album of the year.

The opening track, Eulogy, is only 1 minute 34 seconds in length - which is both frustratingly short (when I'm listening to it, I want it to go on forever) and perfect.

Not everyone grows up to be an astronaut
Not everyone was born to be a king
Not everyone can be... Freddie Mercury
But everyone can raise a glass and sing
Well I haven't always been a perfect person
I haven't done what mum and dad had dreamed

But on the day I die I'll say
"At least I fucking tried!"
That's the only eulogy I need
That's the only eulogy I need.

It's one of those songs that makes me want to go on living. There can be no finer praise.

Brilliant! Tragic!- the new record from Art Brut - isn't quite as brilliant as much of their previous output, nor is it entirely tragic. There's a lot to enjoy here, from Eddie actually trying to sing rather than just talk or shout, to their heartfelt tribute to Axl Rose, to the wonderful Bad Comedian and its appropriately corny lyrics.

You're walking around like love's young dream
He dresses like he comes free with the NME
How can you bear to hold his hand?
I bet he signs his name in Comic Sans

Best reason to buy this record though - as opposed to just downloading it - is the beautiful artwork by Phonogram's Jamie McKelvie. Album cover of the year, no competition.



Finally, I got a real urge to listen to some old Pogues the other night, in particular the track below, possibly their finest moment. I thought I'd mention here because the alternative was to come up with a Top Ten Songs About Ford Cars...

...or a Top Ten Songs About Dodgy Top Shelf Magazines From The 80s.

Be grateful I'm sparing you that...

My Rise of the Planet of the Apes Review

The worst thing about the new POTA movie is the title. Repeat "of the"s sound clumsy. And 'Rise'? Why not Dawn? Or Birth? Or even the original working title, Genesis? "Rise" is a rubbish word, and that goes double for the next Batman film.

Beyond that, the fun begins. This is the first Apes movie where the titular (don't call 'em) monkeys are all-CGI rather than Roddy MacDowall or Tim Roth in ape suits and make-up. Of course, it's Andy Serkis behind the CGI as he's the only actor in the whole of Hollywood whose facial expressions can be motion-captured by computers. Fact. I thought I wasn't going to like all this computer generated idiocy. I grew up on ape suits and make-up (it was a confusing childhood) and I've long been a critic of the misuse of rubbish CGI over more traditional sfx techniques. But... damn it if these aren't some of the best CGI fx I've ever seen, only occasionally did I remember the chimps weren't real. And no 3D either - always a bonus.

The writers have worked hard to give us a credible origin story and an emotionally involving one. Scientist James Franco is desperate to find a cure for his dad's Alzheimers. Caesar, one of the apes he's testing his new brain-boosting drug on, may hold the key. But give Caesar a brain and he doesn't want to be an ape any more - he wants to be part of the family. Inevitably we end up rooting for the apes more than the humans - and by the end of the film, so does Franco.

Rise is peppered with references to the future / past Apes movies as NASA's first manned mission to Mars takes place in the background and the astronauts are soon lost in space. The in-jokes may go a little too far when we see the original Charlton Heston Apes movie playing on a TV in the background. If that movie exists in this reality... didn't anybody heeds its warning? My favourite reference comes from Harry Potter's Malfoy, now seeking alternate employment but still a sleazebag, as he tells Caesar to, "take your stinking paws off me, you damn dirty ape!" A famous line from the original Apes epic, and one that's cropped up in a few other movies too...

An Object Of Beauty

I was a huge fan of Steve Martin's previous novel, Shopgirl (and the movie it inspired) so when I found a proof copy of his latest book, An Object Of Beauty, in the local charity shop, I was happy to plunk down my two quid for Help The Aged.

This novel is a harder sell than its predecessor though, largely because it's central protagonist, Lacey Yeager, is much less likable than the heroine of Shopgirl. Lacey is a mover and shaker on the New York art scene: a flirty, flighty, at times duplicitous, deceptively shallow creature who shimmies up the slippery pole, playing the game by her own rules and doing whatever it takes to get to the top. She's the sort of woman I'd hate unconditionally if I ever met her in person, so it's to Martin's credit that I was drawn into her story - and the insane world she inhabits. I don't have a great deal of interest in art history - particularly not modern art. I'm happy to look at it in a gallery or museum but I rarely care about the men and women behind the canvases. Martin's skill is to make artists, gallery owners and collectors as fascinating as the artwork they obsess over...

Alberg was a collector with a quick purse, which delighted those on the receiving end of things. He had a body shaped like a bowling pin and would sometimes accidentally dress like one too, wearing a white suit with a wide red belt. His wife, Cornelia, was thin where he was wide, and wide where he was thin, so when they stood side by side, they fit together like Texas and Louisiana. There was always a buzz when he entered a room, a buzz that could be described as negative.

Although the novel proceeds from the late 90s through the early years of the 21st century, there's a timeless quality to Martin's writing that reminded me of another great New York novel, Breakfast At Tiffany's. While Lacey Yeager is no Holly Golightly (she wishes!), the circles she moves in and the predicaments she faces reminded me very much of Capote's classic. Although Franks, the narrator (a thinly veiled Martin substitute) does have a habit of running off into turgid lectures on The Scene at times, you can easily skip those and still enjoy the wonderfully observed tale of a group of insane characters increasingly divorced from reality due to their involvement in the murky and mental world of art.