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Announcing m0vie blog: the book!

And it’s official, I am a published author. My book, Pass the Popcorn: A Movie Memoir of 2011, went on-sale from Amazon.com last night, and can be purchased for the low-low price of $1.22 ($0.99 + tax) by clicking here. It’s basically a collection of essays and articles I wrote for the site, collected in one place, from 2011 and earlier. It’s really just an attempt to take some of my essays on film and bundle them up in a way to maybe raise the profile of the blog.

While I’ve drafted a new introduction and revised some of the pieces, all the articles can be found in some way, shape or form on the blog. Still, if you like it, tell a friend, pass it on. Get it as a gift for the film nerd in your life. If it’s successful, I’ll put together another collection next year. If it isn’t, well, at least it was worth a shot. Even after tax, you’re paying less than 1c for every 600 words, so what do you have to lose?

The blog has always been tremendously personal, a place for me to share my hastily-formed poorly-articulated thoughts on the movie issues of the day. Nothing was too big for me to share a random couple of thoughts about it, nor was anything too small. I’m happy with that, and that’s what the blog, hopefully, will continue to be. A place for me talk randomly about incredibly esoteric movie stuff.

Anyway, it’s been a tremendous year for the blog, in terms of readership and popularity. Since I won the Irish Blog Award back in March, things have taken off, and I’ve just been delighted with how everything’s gone. So I’d like to thank everyone for their support and encouragement, and even just for reading. It was a great 2011. I’d feel guilty asking for a better 2012, but hopefully it can be just as good. All I can hope is that I can continue to improve as a writer and eventually justify the run of good luck I’ve been having.

Cheers,
Darren.

Whatever Happened to Ron Underwood? One-Shots, Wash-Ups & Never-Has-Beens…

I think it’s happened to all of us. We’re flicking through the television channels, and we hit on an old movie we like. In my case, it was the superb 1990 B-movie Tremors. As we’re watching it, and remembering how much we loved it, our mind gets to wondering, “Whatever happened to that guy?” It could be an actor, an actress, a director or a writer. It’s somebody who showed a decent amount of talent (or, in the most frustrating circumstances, a phenomenal amount of talent), but who seemed to fade from view, and who we never heard from again. In this case, it was the director of the film, Ron Underwood. Whatever happened to that guy? Are they still alive? Are they still working? Why haven’t I heard from them since this one really good film I’m watching?

One shot at fame and fortune?

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My Best of 2011: Black Swan & The Elevation of Schlock…

It’s that time of the year. To celebrate 2011, and the countdown to 2012, I’m going to count down my own twelve favourite films of the year, one a day until New Year’s Eve. I’m also going to talk a bit about how or why I chose them, and perhaps what makes this list “my” best of 2011, rather than any list claiming to be objective.

Black Swan is number six. Check out my original review here.

It’s interesting, how one can end up loving the same films, for very different reasons. I suspect that a great many critics and commentators lavish praise on Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan for its elegance and sophistication, which I appreciate and admire. There’s a lot to love about the film. However, my own appreciation of the movie seems to be for a very different reason. I think that what makes Black Swan so utterly compelling is the fact that it’s essentially a classic horror movie elevated to the status of fine art.

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Joe the Barbarian: The Deluxe Edition (Review)

December is “Grant Morrison month” here at the m0vie blog, as we take the month to consider and reflect on one of the most critically acclaimed (and polarising) authors working in the medium.

Ultimus Alpha tells it how it is, Kid. This fairtale’s on a one-way trip to Hell.

Joe the Barbarian isn’t Grant Morrison at his creative peak. It isn’t going to redefine the medium, or become an enduring classic for the ages. If it features on college reading lists, I suspect it will be sorted with the “optional” texts somewhere below the “key” Morrisonian works. That doesn’t mean that Joe the Barbarian is bad or anything nearly as drastic. It’s a nice little fairytale fantasy story, one that feels like Morrison paying homage to a bizarre mix of Cabaret and The Lord of the Rings. There’s a lot here to enjoy, but there’s nothing that’ll really knock anybody’s socks off.

Swordplay...

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Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers of Victory: Zatanna (Review/Retrospective)

December is “Grant Morrison month” here at the m0vie blog, as we take the month to consider and reflect on one of the most critically acclaimed (and polarising) authors working in the medium. We’ve got a special treat for you this week, which is “Seven Soldiers Week”, so check back each day for a review of one of the Seven Soldier miniseries that Morrison put together.

Zatanna is undoubtedly the most recognisable DC comics character among Morrison’s seven-character line-up. Sure, Frankenstein is a cultural icon and Mister Miracle is a member of Kirby’s New Gods, but Zatanna is an iconic part of the DC Universe, with her own rich and established history which has played into large events within the fictional universe repeatedly. As such, it’s no surprise that she is the only member of the Seven Soldiers ensemble to have a current on-going series – written by long-time Batman author Paul Dini. Of course, Dini mostly handles his own interpretation of the stage magician, to the point that this little four-issue series might really have never happened. Still, I’m glad it did, if only because Morrison gets to handle some pretty important character beats and acknowledge the character’s rich history at the same time.

I take my hat off to Morrison...

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Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers of Victory: Shining Knight (Review)

December is “Grant Morrison month” here at the m0vie blog, as we take the month to consider and reflect on one of the most critically acclaimed (and polarising) authors working in the medium. We’ve got a special treat for you this week, which is “Seven Soldiers Week”, so check back each day for a review of one of the Seven Soldier miniseries that Morrison put together.

Shining Knight is one of those heroes that Morrison picked from relative obscurity for his Seven Soldiers project. The only encounter I ever had with the character was watching an episode of Justice League Unlimited featuring the original Seven Soldiers line-up as a bit of an in-joke. So, I don’t really have any frame of reference for how Morrison is reworking the character here, but I imagine it’s quite thoroughly.

Winging it...

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Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers of Victory: The Guardian (Review)

December is “Grant Morrison month” here at the m0vie blog, as we take the month to consider and reflect on one of the most critically acclaimed (and polarising) authors working in the medium. We’ve got a special treat for you this week, which is “Seven Soldiers Week”, so check back each day for a review of one of the Seven Soldier miniseries that Morrison put together.

The Guardian really just gives Grant Morrison a chance to play with a whole bunch of high concept crazy ideas inside a loose superhero framework, while allowing the scribe to play with various outmoded comic book concepts. Of course, there are elements of that within the other stories (and, to be frank, within most other major superhero titles the author has ever written), but The Guardian stands out amongst these Seven Soldiers of Victory miniseries as perhaps the most “Morrison-esque” of them.

Making headlines...

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Grant Morrison’s Seven Soldiers of Victory: Frankenstein (Review/Retrospective)

December is “Grant Morrison month” here at the m0vie blog, as we take the month to consider and reflect on one of the most critically acclaimed (and polarising) authors working in the medium. We’ve got a special treat for you this week, which is “Seven Soldiers Week”, so check back each day for a review of one of the Seven Soldier miniseries that Morrison put together.

Sometimes we all get too caught up in Morrison’s wonderful symbolism, mysticism and deeper meaning. Sometimes comic books don’t need to be anything more than a ridiculous premise executed in wonderful style. The covers to this miniseries tell you all you need to know, as does the opening splash page, featuring the monster striding into action as an off-screen character declares, “Die, Frankenstein, die!” You know you’re in for a wonderful high-concept action adventure which isn’t going try to be anything more than effortlessly cool. It’s moments like this which remind you, quite simply, that Grant Morrison loves comics, just as much as you and I do.

Words cannot describe how awesome this is...

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Lyrical Dissonance: Musical Musings…

I don’t normally write about music here… probably because I know next-to-nothing of music. I couldn’t pick most modern musicians out of a line-up. Not in a “modern musicians suck” sort of way, but in a “I don’t really listen to the radio, and therefore pop music” sort of way. So I’m actually even less qualified than a layman to talk of music and such. Still, I have to admit that I am fascinated at how so few people who rate so many classic songs so highly seem to be aware of what the song they’re listening to (or singing along to) is even about. While it isn’t anything that “grinds my gears”, I am still a little amused every time I hear Every Breath You Take played at a wedding, or Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) played at graduation.

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Non-Review Review: Catch Me If You Can

Catch Me If You Can is an enjoyable little film which feels like Spielberg indulging in some sixties nostalgia, while allowing Leonardo DiCaprio to scratch yet another name off his “greatest living directors” bingo card. It’s always impressive when a movie running for two-and-a-half hours just breezes by – some might suggest that such a film is “light”, and it’s a hard position to disagree with, but I think it marks a nice change of pace from the darker movies Spielberg was directing during the first decade of the new millennium. It’s not a classic, but it’s an enjoyable piece of cinema, crafted by talented people, that moves almost as fast as its lead character.

They should cheque better next time...

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