I was deeply saddened to hear about this.
Had the Israeli fighters not chosen this occasion to show a bit of self restraint, the world would not have been denied one of the most beautiful pieces of poetic justice to have ever happened. Boo.
Not that I want Tony Blair (seen here defining his premiership) dead, of course. I'm just a really massive fan of irony.
Friday 23 May 2008
The obligatory Indiana Jones review
Archaeology, as those of you with brains will know, is a rather dull practice that involves digging around int he dirt looking for stuff left behind by previous generations in the hope it will prove to be of some value or at least interest today. For this reason it's often been said that Indiana Jones, with his whip and Nazis, is hardly a conventional archaeologist. The "new" Indy film does pay homage to the noble profession of Tony Robinson and the gang in another way, however, by digging up a load of useless old shit and rubbing it gleefully in our faces.
If you wanted a one word review of Indiana Jones, then you're going to be sorely fucking disappointed. I've written fifty already. But had I chosen to constrain myself with a singular word limit I would have chosen 'old'. Why? Because everything about this film feels sodding ancient. From the hackneyed cut-and-paste from 'Raiders' plot that replaces God with Aliens and the Nazis with the commies, to the uninspiring dialogue lifted from every straight to video 'action' move of the last twenty years, to the fact Harrison Ford looks genuinely geriatric, everything about it screams 'old hat. The feeling of decrepidness is almost intoxicating, which is a shame in what is supposed to be a fun action movie.
But was this really a bad film? Well, yes. I'm surprised you asked, actually, considering the quite unequivocal criticism I've given it so far. I'm starting wonder if you've really been paying proper attention. But it did have it's moments.
This film is great if you like your movies to be over the top. I mean really over the top. It couldn't have been more "over the top" if it was a re-enactment of the battle of the Somme with pogo sticks. And that's about the only thing it gets right. This is a film where the main character is kidnapped by Communists, finds an alien body in area fifty one and is fired on the front of a nuclear missile, all in the first ten minutes.
Sadly, as I've outlined above, the film's turgid style means it ultimately lacks believability, interest and even novelty value. It's so stuck in the past that there's even a fencing scene, and so predictable you see it coming forty minutes ahead of time.
On the other hand it's also just spectacular enough to have the sword fight happen on the back of two jeeps chasing each other through the amazon jungle - a plot element I honestly didn't see coming.
In all likelihood, if you've been looking forward to seeing this film, no number of bad reviews are likely to stop you. Which is a shame, as Hollywood will probably take this as a cue to finally fire the last vaguely creative person still working in the industry and continue churning out unoriginal, cookie cutter crap like this.
If you wanted a one word review of Indiana Jones, then you're going to be sorely fucking disappointed. I've written fifty already. But had I chosen to constrain myself with a singular word limit I would have chosen 'old'. Why? Because everything about this film feels sodding ancient. From the hackneyed cut-and-paste from 'Raiders' plot that replaces God with Aliens and the Nazis with the commies, to the uninspiring dialogue lifted from every straight to video 'action' move of the last twenty years, to the fact Harrison Ford looks genuinely geriatric, everything about it screams 'old hat. The feeling of decrepidness is almost intoxicating, which is a shame in what is supposed to be a fun action movie.
But was this really a bad film? Well, yes. I'm surprised you asked, actually, considering the quite unequivocal criticism I've given it so far. I'm starting wonder if you've really been paying proper attention. But it did have it's moments.
This film is great if you like your movies to be over the top. I mean really over the top. It couldn't have been more "over the top" if it was a re-enactment of the battle of the Somme with pogo sticks. And that's about the only thing it gets right. This is a film where the main character is kidnapped by Communists, finds an alien body in area fifty one and is fired on the front of a nuclear missile, all in the first ten minutes.
Sadly, as I've outlined above, the film's turgid style means it ultimately lacks believability, interest and even novelty value. It's so stuck in the past that there's even a fencing scene, and so predictable you see it coming forty minutes ahead of time.
On the other hand it's also just spectacular enough to have the sword fight happen on the back of two jeeps chasing each other through the amazon jungle - a plot element I honestly didn't see coming.
In all likelihood, if you've been looking forward to seeing this film, no number of bad reviews are likely to stop you. Which is a shame, as Hollywood will probably take this as a cue to finally fire the last vaguely creative person still working in the industry and continue churning out unoriginal, cookie cutter crap like this.
Tuesday 20 May 2008
Insomnia
Sleeping should be easy. In theory, it should be the single easiest thing a human being can do. In fact, I shouldn't really have to 'do' anything, just stop doing other things. Stop thinking, close my eyes and lie down. Or some such combination of those things.
Sadly, I am piss poor at this one of life's little challenges, which is why I am still awake at six in the fucking morning with a radio show to do at three this afternoon. I've already given up on even dreaming (ha) of sleep, meaning I will be either A.) Turgid and dull or B.) Manic and hyper when i finally hit the air waves at 3 P.M. this afternoon.
I wouldn't my chronic lack of fatigue syndrome so much if this wasn't the second night in a row it's happened, meaning by the time i finish my radio show I'll have had 5 hours sleep out of the last 48 and, by all rights, I should have dropped off before my head hit the pillow last night.
It could be the terrifying documentary I watched last night about Shipman wannabe 'Reverend Death' - a West Virginia (born and raised) preacher who helps non terminally ill people to die. I was in two minds about this subject initially until I realised many of his clients seemed to be suffering from nothing much worse than chronic boredom and loneliness or, in one notable case, a woman who wanted to kill herself because (I shit you not) she'd been bitten by a spider.
This particular woman changed her mind on the topic of assisted suicide, however, when she saw, in the Reverend's talent for demortifying the willing, the opportunity to quite literally make a killing. $7000 Plus expenses was the tab for a New Zealand woman who wanted to kill herself because she couldn't find a medication that worked for her breathing problems.
It was at this point what had been a documentary about an eccentric, maverick but possibly misguided man spasmed into a horror movie about these latter day kevorkian's less than selfless desires and almost fetishistic idolisation of death.
Is it much wonder I couldn't sleep? I was half expecting a be-collared angle of death to fly through the window and start dripping poison into my mouth like John Cussack in Grosse Point Blank.
Sadly, I am piss poor at this one of life's little challenges, which is why I am still awake at six in the fucking morning with a radio show to do at three this afternoon. I've already given up on even dreaming (ha) of sleep, meaning I will be either A.) Turgid and dull or B.) Manic and hyper when i finally hit the air waves at 3 P.M. this afternoon.
I wouldn't my chronic lack of fatigue syndrome so much if this wasn't the second night in a row it's happened, meaning by the time i finish my radio show I'll have had 5 hours sleep out of the last 48 and, by all rights, I should have dropped off before my head hit the pillow last night.
It could be the terrifying documentary I watched last night about Shipman wannabe 'Reverend Death' - a West Virginia (born and raised) preacher who helps non terminally ill people to die. I was in two minds about this subject initially until I realised many of his clients seemed to be suffering from nothing much worse than chronic boredom and loneliness or, in one notable case, a woman who wanted to kill herself because (I shit you not) she'd been bitten by a spider.
This particular woman changed her mind on the topic of assisted suicide, however, when she saw, in the Reverend's talent for demortifying the willing, the opportunity to quite literally make a killing. $7000 Plus expenses was the tab for a New Zealand woman who wanted to kill herself because she couldn't find a medication that worked for her breathing problems.
It was at this point what had been a documentary about an eccentric, maverick but possibly misguided man spasmed into a horror movie about these latter day kevorkian's less than selfless desires and almost fetishistic idolisation of death.
Is it much wonder I couldn't sleep? I was half expecting a be-collared angle of death to fly through the window and start dripping poison into my mouth like John Cussack in Grosse Point Blank.
Friday 9 May 2008
The droids you were looking for:
Hey, baby.
I'm sorry I was gone so long. I know it ain't right to treat you this way.
Things will be different from now on. I promise.
Let me remind you of the good times we had together by flagrantly ripping off articles I published in my old blog (reprinted over the next two posts, more to follow).
Let me also remind you that you can read any of the old Out Of Loo Rolls by visiting:
http://www.surhul.co.uk/orbital/content/index.php?page=12
we are in every issue (except issue five, i was 'busy' that week) and are funny in almost two of them!
From now on, now the exam season is over and you have time to read my shit, I will actually start writing stuff in here again. Starting in the VNF (the 'very near future' - when all the stuff i plan to do happens) with covering my good friend Rachel Boyd's fantastic blog.
For those of you who, for whatever reasons, like to look at things before I have decided what to tell you to think about them, here's a link:
bioduels.blgospot.com
I've been meaning to link to this forever but have had other things on. It's a fantastic and fantastically well written blog which addresses some of the core issues affecting our tragically fucked world. So read it.
Not that I'm 'leaking' my verdict on this, or anything...
I'm sorry I was gone so long. I know it ain't right to treat you this way.
Things will be different from now on. I promise.
Let me remind you of the good times we had together by flagrantly ripping off articles I published in my old blog (reprinted over the next two posts, more to follow).
Let me also remind you that you can read any of the old Out Of Loo Rolls by visiting:
http://www.surhul.co.uk/orbital/content/index.php?page=12
we are in every issue (except issue five, i was 'busy' that week) and are funny in almost two of them!
From now on, now the exam season is over and you have time to read my shit, I will actually start writing stuff in here again. Starting in the VNF (the 'very near future' - when all the stuff i plan to do happens) with covering my good friend Rachel Boyd's fantastic blog.
For those of you who, for whatever reasons, like to look at things before I have decided what to tell you to think about them, here's a link:
bioduels.blgospot.com
I've been meaning to link to this forever but have had other things on. It's a fantastic and fantastically well written blog which addresses some of the core issues affecting our tragically fucked world. So read it.
Not that I'm 'leaking' my verdict on this, or anything...
Yeats
On this occasion, I have chosen to mock Yeats' seminal work 'The Second Coming'. I shall do so mainly by taking it litterally.
Seminal, like semen.
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Then shout louder.
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Shoddy design.
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
Insufficient respect for anarchy
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
The worst are always full of passionate intensity. that is what makes them so very shit.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming!
Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
http://www.phreeow.net/wiki/tiki-index.php?page=Spiritus+Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
Obviously.
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
Fucking livid they were.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Not confined by your own historical context are we, Yeats? 'Sleeping' is definitely what the world did for two millennia after Jesus . Buy a fucking history book.
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
Look, what with it's body of a lizard and head of a man, and our knowledge of it's general direction of travel, this beast seems rather easy to identify and stop. Particularly as it's method of ambulation is 'slouching' one of the less graceful and efficient forms of movement. Quit whining and fucking sort it you pretentious twat.
That's it. Sorry.
Seminal, like semen.
Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Then shout louder.
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Shoddy design.
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
Insufficient respect for anarchy
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
The worst are always full of passionate intensity. that is what makes them so very shit.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
Yes, surely. You, alone, of all of the billions of people who have always, throughout time, thought the world was about to end, are right. How very prescient of you. And now, a meagre century later, you have been proven so very right, haven't you? Twunt.
The Second Coming!
Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi
http://www.phreeow.net/wiki/tiki-index.php?page=Spiritus+Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
Obviously.
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
Fucking livid they were.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
Not confined by your own historical context are we, Yeats? 'Sleeping' is definitely what the world did for two millennia after Jesus . Buy a fucking history book.
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?
Look, what with it's body of a lizard and head of a man, and our knowledge of it's general direction of travel, this beast seems rather easy to identify and stop. Particularly as it's method of ambulation is 'slouching' one of the less graceful and efficient forms of movement. Quit whining and fucking sort it you pretentious twat.
That's it. Sorry.
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