Posted on November 21, 2009 by Darren
Hmm… A little part of me is so surprised that everybody is taking this whole ‘retirement’ thing with Robert Downey Jnr. so seriously. Yes, he talked about quitting while he’s ahead – an act that many former stars would have done well to consider – and seems to long for a bit of quite time:
I’ve never had it this good — this is my day in the sun — and I certainly don’t want to look a gift horse in the molars. But [my wife] Susan and I want to begin to be in our lives as much as we are in our jobs. I’d love just to sit here and say, ‘What movie’s playing tonight?’ I’d love to finish the new book about D-day I’m reading. I love painting, I love music.
I’m far too cynical to be driven to a state of panic about the loss of one of the finest talents to re-emerge over the past two or three years. Experience has taught us that there’s quite a distance between ‘retiring’ and ‘retired’ in Hollywood.
No need to feel down about Downey...
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: actors, retire, retirement, retiring, robert downey, robert downey jnr., viggo mortensen | Leave a comment »
Posted on November 20, 2009 by Darren
Myself and the better half had a very… theatrical evening last night. First we stopped by Trinity to check out the up-and-coming talent during their “directors’ debut” season (running for the next three weeks, if you feel like taking a chance with your theatre-going) and then we went on to catch a performance of the HMS Pinafore playing at the National Concert Hall from the Rathmines & Rathgar Musical Society (the people behind The Producers at the The Gaiety earlier this year). It’s rare that we get a Gilbert & Sullivan musical performed in full, so was it worth it?
Yes, this is the only photo we have...
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Filed under: Theatre | Tagged: dublin, gilbert & sullivan, HMS Pinafore, musical, National Concert Hall, pinafore, R & R, Rathmines & Rathgar Musical Society, Rathmines and Rathgar Musical Society, Theatre | Leave a comment »
Posted on November 19, 2009 by Darren
It began simply enough. “You like Batman better than Superman,” my girlfriend asserted over dinner a few weeks ago. I couldn’t dipute the claim, but mounted a fairly swift defense of the character as “misunderstood”. That prompted an incredulous response which suggested that I “like Batman better because he’s darker”. That’s an interesting assertion. I don’t believe it’s true – certainly not in my case at any rate. I think the public’s perception of Batman as a more enduring, more fascinating and all round ‘cooler’ pop culture icon that the Man of Steel stems from a whole host of factors, that can’t be succinctly summed up with an observation that one is dark and gritty and the other is light and fluffy. So, why are we fonder of the Caped Crusader that the big blue boy scout?
Notice how Superman is trying to look half as badass as Batman...
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Filed under: Comics, Movies | Tagged: batman, batman vs. superman, dark, darker and edgier, dc comics, fear, hope, light, opposites, superman | 2 Comments »
Posted on November 18, 2009 by Darren
I had the pleasure of rewatching bits and pieces of the seventh season of 24 with my parents (as they are equally avid fans of the show). We recently completed the final double episode and I have to admit that it only really occurred to me how well the writers had constructed Tony as a shadowy counterpart to their lead. I’ve already expressed my thoughts on the season as a whole, but I just thought I’d make a quick note of some of the more interesting parallels and ponder whether Jack is really so much better than Tony.
Clothes colour coded for your convenience... white=good, black=bad....
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Filed under: Television | Tagged: 24, counterpart, echo, jack bauer, kiefer sutherland, mirror, reflection, shadow archetype, Television, tony almeida | Leave a comment »
Posted on November 17, 2009 by Darren
I adore Batman Returns. It tends to be a rather polarising film, and certainly a polarising Batman adaptation. It was famously too dark and too weird for mainstream audiences, with too much creepy and freaky stuff serving to distress the parents of children who gobbled up Batman-themed Happy Meals. I think it holds up the best of the four Burton and Schumacher Batman films, because it finds a way to balance Burton’s unique approach and style with that of the Caped Crusader. While Burton’s Batman occasionally struggled to balance the director’s vision with a relatively conventional plot (to the point where Vicki Vale stuck out like a sore thumb, and the movie wasn’t the most coherently plotted of films), here there’s a much greater sense of balance at play, and a feeling that Burton isn’t compromising, and yet is working with the characters.
Shine a light…
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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: batman, batman returns, Bruce, bruce wayne, burton, catwoman, christmas, christopher walken, danny devito, michael keaton, michelle pfeiffer, non-review review, Penguin, review, the penguin, tim burton | 3 Comments »
Posted on November 17, 2009 by Darren
What makes a hero? Is it a cosmic rod and a kick-ass pair of glare-reducing goggles? Is it being a “grim avenger full of hate for the bad” (one of Robinson’s more subtle jabs at Batman during this run)? Or is it simply “doing what’s right because it is”? Is it the honest desire to make the world a better place with “no vengeful motivation” or “nothing ulterior”? We may be getting ahead of ourselves here, but James Robinson really digs into what constitutes a ‘true’ hero here, looking at the classic simplistic conception of the superhero, rejecting the violence of the anti-hero or the deconstruction which has crept into comics over the past few years (mostly in lieu of character development or to seem darker and edgier). Is that what a hero is?
I don’t know, but I find myself agreeing with Batman. No matter how you cut it, Jack Knight is a hero.
A Knight in shining armour...
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Filed under: Comics | Tagged: batman, Black Canary, dc comics, green lantern, jack knight, james robinson, review, Shade, starman, starman omnibus, starman omnibus: volume 3, ted knight, tony harris, Woody Allen | Leave a comment »
Posted on November 16, 2009 by Darren
Of all the people to survive, he’s not the one you would have chosen, is it? But if you could choose, Doctor, if you could decide who lives and who dies… that would make you a monster.
– Mr. Cooper, Voyage of the Damned
The Waters of Mars is a lot more intense than I was expecting. It started out as a standard base under seige story with more than an echo of the era of the fourth Doctor about it, but then something happened. The Doctor made the decision that he’s made before – and which he explicitly compares in the episode to the decision to watch Pompeii burn in The Fires of Pompeii – the decision to walk away. And then the episode kicks it up a notch and becomes a fantastically appropriate penultimate story for this incarnation of The Doctor.
A Mars attack...
Note: There are naturally spoilers for the episode under discussion below. If you want a recommendation, then here it is: this is the best episode of the new series since Midnight over a year ago. It has some pacing issues and a very standard opening half. But the finalé is a perfect dovetail of the core themes of Davies’ run on the show.
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Filed under: Television | Tagged: bbc, bowie base one, david tennant, doctor who, doctor who specials, fires of pompeii, lonely god, mars, review, russell t. davies, specials, Television, the fires of pompeii, the master, the waters of mars, time lords, waters of mars | Leave a comment »
Posted on November 15, 2009 by Darren
Wes Craven is a very odd man. On one hand, you have the luminary who gave us the breathtakingly original slants on the horror movie which we saw in A Nightmare on Elm Street, New Nightmare and the Scream franchise, along with his talent as a straight-forward thriller director in Red Eye. On the other hand you have the king of schlock, the man behind pointless gore fests like the original Last House on the Left or The Hills Have Eyes or even Dracula 2000. And, on a third severed hand you’d probably find lying around his trailer somewhere, you have the Wes Craven who wholeheartedly approves and supports schlokier remakes of his schlokiest films. Like this, the remake of Last House on the Left.
The only thing to fear is the quality of the movie itself...
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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: brutalisation, feminism, film, horror, last house on the left, Movie, non-review review, remake, review, slasher, the last house on the left, victimisation, wes craven | Leave a comment »
Posted on November 14, 2009 by Darren
Do you remember when Robert Zemeckis used to make accessible films starring actual human beings? Films that were no less magical because filming was constrained by reality rather than computer generated imagery. Well, apparently that Zemeckis is long gone at this stage, as he’s announced that he’s going to be following up A Christmas Carol with The Nutcracker, a similar CGI adaptation.
So many inappropriate jokes, so little time...
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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: a christmas carol, animation, cgi, films, live action, Movies, robert zemeckis, the nutcracker, toy story | Leave a comment »
Posted on November 13, 2009 by Darren
In my defense, I haven’t seen the original 2002 movie The Gathering Storm, to which this movie serves as a sequel – but I think the movie (as a historical piece) stands very well on its own two feet. Besides, aside from the producers (the brothers Scott, obviously attempting to follow Spielberg into the World War II market) and writer (Hugh Whitemore), the series has little in common with its illustrious predecessor. The director is new. The roles have been recast. If it weren’t for the linking theme of the word ‘Storm’ in the title and the fact that this movie picks up where the other left off (at least chronologically), there would be nothing to really tie it down. So, with the confession that I have not seen the original made-for-TV movie, what did I think of Into The Storm?
Cry Havok! And let slip the insurance-selling dogs of war!
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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews, Television | Tagged: brendan gleeson, churchill, drama, hbo, into the storm, made-for-television, Movie, non-review review, review, Television, winston churchill | 2 Comments »
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