christmas | the m0vie blog

Non-Review Review: Dreams of a Life

Posted on December 29, 2011 by Darren

From Irish director Carol Morley, Dreams of a Life is a fascinating and occasionally heartbreaking exploration of the death of Joyce Vincent, the young lady found dead in her flat above a London Shopping Centre. Joyce had been dead for three years before anybody noticed, her body only recovered when her landlord secured a repossession order for the small, sparsely decorated flat where she had been living. The most surreal detail of all, and one of the lingering questions at the end of the document, concerns the Christmas presents found wrapped beside her body. Who were they for? And how did their intended recipients never notice that Joyce was missing.

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: Carol Morley, christmas, Dreams of a Life, Human League, IFI, Isaac Hayes, Joyce, Joyce Vincent, London, Morley, nelson mandela, non-review review, review | Leave a comment »

The Art of Compromise: Picking the Family Christmas Movie…

Posted on December 26, 2011 by Darren

Christmas is a fun time in my household. We pack in the entire extended family for a day of fun and celebration, a nice dinner, some drinks. They stay over for a night or two and we do all the usual family activities. Christmas night, we watch a movie. St. Stephen’s night, we play a game of Texas Hold ‘Em Poker. As you can imagine, finding a movie that thirteen-odd people will sit down and enjoy in a crowded sitting room by the fire, glasses of wine and popcorn handy, is no mean feat. And, I admit with some measure of pride, the task is assigned to me: I’m the one asked to come up with a suitable movie for the Christmas evening. And, as much as it’s a fun task, it’s also a daunting one.

Ghosts of Christmas past...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: christmas, Edward Scissorhands, film, Hangover, holiday, hollywood, indiana jones, Nightmare Before Christmas, Terrence Malick, tim burton | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: The Doctor, The Widow & The Wardrobe (Review)

Posted on December 25, 2011 by Darren

Where are we?

In a forest. In a box. In the sitting room. Try to keep up.

– Lily and the Doctor sum things up

I could get used to this “coopting a holiday classic” thing that Steven Moffat has going. After all, last year riffed on A Christmas Carol (right down to the name), and this one leans pretty heavily on The Lion, The Witch & The Wardrobe. I imagine a Doctor Who episode themed around It’s a Wonderful Life can’t be too far away. Still, strangely enough, the episode worked best as an illustration of the show’s wonderful heart and its charming understanding of childhood psychology – even if the actual science-fiction plot was a little disappointing and the ending felt like a bit of a copout. Certainly not quite as good as last year’s entry into the Doctor Who Christmas canon, but not a waste of time either.

It left me a bit cold...

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: bbc, christmas, doctor, doctor who, DoctorWho, Lily, MattSmith, Moffat, Narnia, review, steven moffat, Television, The Doctor The Widow & The Wardrobe, The Lion The Witch & The Wardrobe, world war ii | 2 Comments »

Potter Might Have a Point: Perhaps It’s Not Such a Wonderful Life After All…

Posted on December 23, 2011 by Darren

I don’t have your money here! It’s in….Bill’s house…And…Fred’s house!

What the hell are you doing with my money in your house Fred?

– The PTA Disbands, The Simpsons

I finally saw Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life. The Helix over at DCU was screening a variety of modern and classic films in a cinema setting, and they chose the Jimmy Stewart classic as their Christmas movie. And quite right, too. However, watching the film, I couldn’t help but get the sense that things weren’t quite as simplistic as the movie made them out to be and that, while George Bailey might be one heck of a nice guy, there’s absolutely no way I’d trust him to handle my finances. While the town’s old miser, Potter, might as well have a moustache to twirl, I can’t help but think that maybe he might have a point or two about George Bailey, something the movie never really addresses.

The deficit is thiiiiiiiis big...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: christmas, films, Frank Capra, George, George Bailey, Helix, It's a Wonderful Life, James Stewart, Movies, Potter, recession, world war ii | 1 Comment »

Non-Review Review: A Christmas Carol (2009)

Posted on November 25, 2011 by Darren

I’m yet to be sold on the Robert Zemeckis school of “motion capture.” Don’t worry, I don’t hold a prejudice. I’m just waiting to be convinced, and I worry that Zemeckis – for all his championing of the technology – might not be the one to do it. For, as impressive as the technical merits of his technique might be, I think that Zemeckis has yet to find a story that truly needs to be told in that format, or at least a story that resonates in that format. Much as Pixar have somewhat validated computer-generated animation (a school of filmmaking that met with a ridiculous amount of cynicism in its early years), I think the key to proving the worth of this sort of approach lies in finding a story that connects with audiences, while demonstrating the strengths of the tool being used to tell it.

While it’s an enjoyable enough holiday film, A Christmas Carol simply is not that film.

Totally Scrooged...

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Filed under: Non-Review Reviews | Tagged: a christmas carol, Bob Hoskins, Charles Dickens, christmas, Christmas Carol, colin firth, films, gary oldman, jim carrey, Movies, Muppet Christmas Carol, non-review review, pixar, review, robert zemeckis | 2 Comments »

The Beginning of the End? Is It Too Early To Be Talking About “The Best of the Year”?

Posted on October 27, 2011 by Darren

The New York Critics’ Circle has moved the date of their annual awards forward to 28th November. I don’t know about you, but that sounds like an awfully early date for a festival designed to celebrate the best of the year that has been – especially when you consider that the logistics of posting and counting votes. It’s a full month before the end of the year! How many films are yet to be screened at this point? It got me thinking about the “best of…” polls that we inevitably see as the year draws to a close? When do people start compiling those lists?

Well, I guess we can all cut this one out of our NYCC pools...

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Filed under: Movies | Tagged: Academy Award, christmas, Come December, david fincher, Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, new york, New York Critics Circle, oscar, steven spielberg | 6 Comments »

Doctor, Who?

Posted on January 4, 2011 by Darren

Believe me. Just believe me for twenty minutes…

My blu ray copy of Doctor Who arrived today and I am delighted. I’ve already written a review of the fifth season (and the Christmas special), but I loved it to pieces – despite its considerable flaws. I’ve done a bit of revisiting today and shall likely continue to view the episodes again later into the week. Anyway, just because I feel like celebrating, here’s a little piece of artwork I found on-line from artist Christopher Jones. I figured it was worth sharing.

Men and their screwdrivers...

Filed under: Television | Tagged: BBC America, Charles Dickens, christmas, Christmas Carol, doctor who, Eleventh Doctor, games, video games | Leave a comment »

Doctor Who: A Christmas Carol

Posted on December 28, 2010 by Darren

Being honest, this Christmas special had me from the moment that Michael Gambon was announced. I might have been a little uncertain when it was stated that Stephen Moffat’s first Christmas episode would be essentially a re-telling of the Dickens classic A Christmas Carol, but I have to admit that I enjoyed it a great deal. That isn’t to pretend that it’s a perfect episode of Doctor Who or that there aren’t significant flaws with the hour of television, but it’s fairly entertaining, features fantastic performances and has a few clever concepts playing about – making it great for seasonal viewing.

The Ghost of Christmas past, present and future...

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: a christmas carol, bbc, christmas, Christmas by medium, Doctor (Doctor Who), doctor who, michael gambon, russell t. davies, scrooge, stephen moffat, steven moffat, Television | 5 Comments »

Doctor Who: The Next Doctor

Posted on February 8, 2010 by Darren

This is nonsense.

That’s one word for it.

Complete and utter wonderful nonsense. Very very silly.

– The “Doctors”

The Doctor Who Christmas special is an annual institution on this side of the Atlantic. Every Christmas Day for the last five years, Christmas dinner has been followed by a sit down to catch up with David Tennant’s time-travelling hero in the yuletide season. These episodes are generally well-constructed popcorn fodder with huge setpieces, great performances, some clever ideas and fairly straightforward plotting – they generally can’t compare to some of the more adventurous episodes of the series. The Next Doctor continues this trend – while it lacks the blockbuster feel of The Voyage of the Damned or the intimacy of The Christmas Invasion, it benefits from added pathos. It isn’t the best episode the show has given us (it isn’t even the best of the season of ‘specials’ produced), but it is a solidly entertaining hour-long programme.

Do too many Doctors spoil a special?

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Filed under: Television | Tagged: christmas, christmas special, david morrissey, david tenannt, doctor who, review, science fiction, Television, the next doctor | Leave a comment »

Non-Review Review: Batman Returns

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.