TV: Homicide: Life on the Street

The most powerful television episode I ever watched was A Model Citizen - season 3, episode 4 of Homicide: Life on the Street.  I can remember the first time I saw it, some time during December 1995 on a small black and white television at my Dad's house in England.  I became hooked on this series and over the years I watched every single episode of the show, repeating most seasons at least once.

In an already emotionally intensive television series, this episode caught my attention because of the use of music at the end of the episode.  As Frank Pembelton struggles to come to terms with being sold out, Munch with having to take alcohol awareness and Felton with the departure of his wife, Nine Inch Nails' Hurt plays in the background.  I discovered for the first time the absolute power music could have on the small screen and I fell absolutely into Felton's world as his world fell apart around him.

If I had to choose the one pivotal television episode in my life, the one episode that pushed me towards a love of television (often to the detriment of my beloved books, music and films) then this would be it.

This would be the television episode that changed my life.

Homicide: Life on the Street remains a strong contender for my favourite television show of all time, along with Charmed and X-Files.

Watch the last 2 minutes of A Model Citizen:

Film: He's Just Not That Into You (2009)

With our brand new Cineworld Unlimited cards in hand, Stephen and I went off to the cinema for an early Saturday morning Valentine's date. If you are wondering why we would choose a Saturday morning rather than a Saturday evening to go to movies, then you obviously haven't sat in a movie theatre in England lately. In South Africa (and every other country I have been to the cinema), people sit still during a movie, they mostly keep quiet and they generally behave and are considerate. In England... they don't. Having picked up that English people don't like to get up too early on weekend mornings, we have found the most peace and quiet by going to the first show in the morning. Otherwise, it is like trying to watch a film in the middle of a busy market with people walking up and down all the time and having complete conversations out loud.

I digress...

He's Just Not That Into You is a delightful film with a large ensemble cast and a cleverly written storyline. We really enjoyed the film and it was the perfect light-hearted film for a Valentine's date. I liked that despite having some big name actors in the cast, it was the lesser known actors that steal the show.

The basic premise of the film is obvious from the title: women are always wondering about the significance of men not calling or treating them like rubbish, when in reality men just don't care. Or so the story goes. The film made a decent attempt at trying to portray the reality behind dating and the harmful lies we tell to each other when we're just trying to bolster someone's confidence.

At the end of the film, some of the storyline weren't predictable at all which was great because it wasn't happy endings all round. Small parts of the film were predictable of course but the net effect was entertainment and the feel-good effect which is fantastic.

For a well-written script, large and interesting cast, entertainment and feeling happy afterwards, I give the film an 8 out of 10. Points deducted because we can't all be Oscar winning Slumdog Millionaire material.

Book Review: Size 14 Is Not Fat Either - Meg Cabot

Light, shallow, with a nice sprinkling of unrequited love.

I'm not going to make too much of a fuss about this book or write too long a review; but when you're looking for something light, Meg Cabot really does hit the spot.

Size 14 Is Not Fat Either is a Heather Wells mystery and is the sequel to Size 12 Is Not Fat which I reviewed earlier this year. Heather Wells is a former child pop star who is now living a life of obscurity and working as a resident hall assistant director. She obviously has a touch of the Jessica Fletcher charm because people seem to get killed around her and she is the one left to solve the murders.

The book was a lot of fun and I enjoyed reading it in a week when I had too much serious stuff on my mind to enjoy anything else. I'm definitely going to get the next book in the series to read the next time my brain goes all scatty and month-end deadlines are rushing by.

Film: Push (2009)

Yesterday morning we went to watch Push, the new sci-fi thriller from director Paul McGuigan starring Chris Evans and Dakota Fanning.  I really enjoyed every single minute of this film even though it felt slightly long at 111 minutes.

In the world of Push, psychic experiments started by the Nazis were carried on after World War II, resulting in people with superhuman powers.  'Pushers' can push thoughts into your mind and make you believe in their version of reality; 'movers' have telekinesis; 'watchers' can see the future and 'shifters' have the amazing power to alter your perception and create illusions.  The problem is that 'Division', a US government agency, wants to control all of the people with these powers, to keep them captive and to carry on experimenting on them.

This brings us to the underworld of Hong Kong, where a group of young expats is thrown together in a fight against Division and the local branch of deadly psychics. 

This film reminded me in so many ways of Anthony Horowitz's Power of Five series and Garth Nix's Shade's Children.  I loved the inventive storyline, the supernatural powers, the fast pace and explosive action.  I was really disappointed to see that the film got such bad ratings on both IMDb and Rotten Tomatoes.  On RT, the film received better ratings from the community than the critics and perhaps that is the point.  This is not a serious movie or an art house film.  It might not appeal to everyone but I imagine that lovers of sci-fi or fantasy young adult fiction might enjoy it as would anyone who enjoys fun, action and teenage superheroes.

Dakota Fanning deserves special mention.  I knew before going to see the film that it had received bad reviews and I also knew that there was talk of Fanning appearing as Jane in New Moon.  I was prepared to be critical and I wasn't sure if I would like the way Fanning was turning out.  Well, her performance was great and I think she is making the move from child star to teenage actress seamlessly.  She seems to be a serious, clever girl and I hope she continues to make decent decisions in both her personal and professional life.

For reminding me of my favourite books, for action, adventure, supernatural powers and teenage heroes, I give the film a 9 out of 10.  Like I said, it just felt a bit long which can happen with non-stop action.

Band: Klaxons

A couple of the new Klaxons' songs have begun to emerge on YouTube and their new album is slated for release later this year. It has occurred to me that many people won't understand my excitement and jubilation when this happen because I have never posted about the absolute wonder that is Klaxons before.

The story starts back in 1996 when I fell in love with the Grace song, Not Over Yet which I craftily posted about here. I remember almost freezing to death camping at Rustler's Valley festival and waking up before dawn, hearing this song and going to dance in my pyjamas just to keep warm. And because I loved the song so much. It took me two years after that to find the song on CD single - you have to love how inaccessible music can be in South Africa.

Anyway, I was driving across England in July 2007 to visit my pets in quarentine, when I heard the Klaxons' remake of Not Over Yet and I loved it. It took me a while to get the album, strangely enough, and even longer to listen to it; but when I did eventually start listening to it, I was blown away.

Every song on the album, Myths Of The Near Future is dramatic and energetic and I soon found myself playing songs like Magick over and over and over again.

We went to see Klaxons at the NME Shockwave Awards concert last year and they just blew me away.  Soon after that I went out and got every single CD single of theirs. In 2006, they had launched a competition to remix their song Atlantis to Interzone and I have to say that the Metronomy remix of that song is the best remix I have ever heard.  Of course, it is a severely acquired taste and not for everyone's tastes, but you can click on the link at the bottom of the post at your peril!

I posted the video for Magick here but this is another brilliant song featuring the Klaxons from the Chemical Brothers album We Are the Night.

 

Finally, here is the Metronomy remix.  It is pretty warped so as I said, listen to it at your own risk!  And remember that it is a remix and not the typical Klaxons offering.  (None of this stopped me from listening to it repeatedly for, oh, about three months solid).

And that, ladies and gentlemen, was Klaxons.  Hopefully some of you will be able to understand my near obsession now (especially you Broken).

Video: Grace - Not Over Yet

This is one of my favourite songs of all time.

Show: Demons

I'm aware that actors sometimes read internet reviews and I am conscious of how hurtful toxic and bad reviews can be.  With this in mind, I'm going to keep my review of Demons short and I'll be mindful not to launch into personal attacks on the actors involved.

Precisely six weeks ago I was very excited as a new show Demons was starting on ITV 1.  I had seen no trailers for the show and knew little about it but I loved the idea of this supernatural, demon hunting thriller.  Then why was I so happy to discover that there was no episode on tonight as the season ended last week?

At the end of the day, the only thing I remotely liked about this show was the theme tune (Eyes of the Night - Starlight Mints).  This is the worst show I have seen since Bonekickers and represents the very worst of UK television.

Firstly, there were no demons.  Fuggly critters, gremlins and vampires maybe.  Zombies even.  But no demons.  Secondly, what on earth possessed them to give Philip Glenister that ridiculous and bad American accent?  Was no one else present during takes?  Did no one else hear how bad it was?  And just how did his character being American add to the story? 

While we're on exercises in redundancy, what was the point of the blind, psychic, concert pianist?  Why was Luke's friend Ruby so damn annoying?  It was all just a page torn out of the book of "Who Cares?"

It took some time for me to warm up to Merlin but Demons was so bad that I really began to long for a bit of shallow Merlin-Arthur banter.

There is a really good article on Demons at DigitalSpy.co.uk.

I'll leave you with a fan video featuring the theme tune and some clips from the show.  Some of the special effects were okay and this fan has managed to capture the only good moments in six weeks of the show in a three minute video.

Film: The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008)

We watched The Curious Case of Benjamin Button today. This is an epic story spanning 87 years about a man who is born old and who ages backwards his whole life. The film is based on a short story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, the talented man behind The Great Gatsby, a book that had a profound effect on me growing up.

I really enjoyed this film. It wasn't as uplifting as Slumdog Millionaire last week and it was quite lengthy at 166 minutes and slow moving too.

Despite that, I would say that this film is an iconic masterpiece in that I have never seen such good special effects in a film before. Brad Pitt played the role of Benjamin Button from the age of approximately 80 to about age 20. In turn, Cate Blanchett played Daisy from age 20 to about 80 too. At no point in the entire film did I look at the characters and think that they got the make up wrong; in fact, I barely noticed the make up at all. (It makes a huge difference from see the foundation lines on the vampires in Twilight!)

Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett gave fantastic performances in this film and while I am surprised that Cate did not receive an Oscar nod for her role, I don't think Brad's performance was quite worthy of his nomination. Taraji P. Henson has been nominated for her role as Queenie, Benjamin's mother and I must say, I did not really notice her performance that much and am unsure that she deserves the nomination. I was surprised to see that she was only 38 though, as she played her character over her entire adult life, as with Brad and Cate's portrayals. Perhaps she is deserving then...

But this is a beautiful film with sweeping cinematography, the costumes were spot on and the set design was fantastic. The Oscar nominations for art direction, cinematography, costume design, make up and visual effects are definitely deserving and I hope to see a win in at least the three last categories. The score has been nominated too and considering how integral the music is to the story, that could be a likely win too. I just preferred the music from Slumdog Millionaire last week.

In terms of the Oscar nomination for best film, I would rather that Slumdog Millionaire gets it. To me, it is just more of an achievement. All in all I would give the film 9 out of 10. Maybe 8.5 because once I realised that 2 hours had gone by already, I got quite restless.

Stephen and I have decided to start going to movies again every week, as it is clear how much we have missed it and how much we still enjoy it. We are going to get Unlimited Cards from Cineworld which cost £11.99 per month for unlimited, anytime movies. It's not exactly R8 or 60p a show but it'll do for now. I'm so excited at the prospect of weekly date nights again!

Book Review: Mister Monday

I'm forever going on about the Awesomeness^© that is Garth Nix but then again, he is such a prolific author that you could read his books non-stop for months and never visit the same world twice in all of that time. Recently, I've actively stopped myself from reading his books for a short while, otherwise the only reviews that would ever appear on here would be Garth Nix reviews!

Many authors will complete one series before moving on to another (for example, J K Rowling and the Harry Potter series) or they may carry two similar series of books simultaneously (for example Anthony Horowitz and the 14-year old, mainly male protagonists in his Power of Five and Alex Rider series). However, the worlds and stories in Nix's three series (as well as his stand alone books) are so unique and so absolutely different from each other that it is possible to read them one after the other (as I have been doing) without getting bored.

So far, I've read two books from Nix's Old Kingdom series, one from his Seventh Tower series and his stand alone book, Shade's Children. Mister Monday is from his Keys to the Kingdom series. To give you an idea of how he writes, he has finished the Seventh Tower series and the last Keys to the Kingdom book is to be released this year with the next Old Kingdom book releasing in 2010. His stand alone book A Confusion of Princes is releasing this year too.

Well, after that rather long introduction, what did I think of Mister Monday? Initially, I was worried that this book would be a bit too young for me and I sought the advice of many of my friends before reading it. The lovely Windrider convinced me to read it in the end though.

The book was not too young for me and in fact, it is a remarkably complex and detailed story. There are so many levels on which this book is just brilliant. Nix has created another wonderful and surreal universe, intricately detailed with the rules, customs and hierarchies of the occupants. This is an author who never disappoints his readers in that respect.

This is a well written book with excellent play on words and the concepts of time and space. There are fantastic villains, my favourite being the dashingly handsome Monday's Noon and unlikely heroes too.

Apart from Shade's Children, this is the first Nix book I have read that has been remotely set in modern times in our world (although like Shade's Children, it is set somewhat in the future following a devastating modern-day flu epidemic). I love it when fantasy books are based in our world and I am eager to read the other books in the series.

Finally, I just wanted to mention how the dog faces and bowlers hats in this story reminded me of the most surreal book I have ever read by author Jeff Noon, Vurt. I think it is definitely time to reread Noon's books and see how I respond to them 15 years down the line.

TV: Prison Break ending

It's old news by now that Prison Break is ending after this season. The show will resume in the US on April 17th and will run for six more episodes plus a 2 hour grand finale. What is news is that I am not sad about this at all.

My relationship with Prison Break started back in early 2006. I had heard of the show starting in the US and had been waiting patiently for it to come to South Africa. What did happen was that they installed massive billboards of Wentworth Miller all over town and I am still not sure how I avoided an accident. There were several very scary episodes involving me nearly getting whiplash whilst staring at one of those billboards and almost driving straight into the minibus taxi in front of me.

Good looks and hot, muscle bound, incarcerated men alone couldn't have carried this show though and when Prison Break did release, it proved itself to be an exhilarating and clever show.

Not that a little good looking can't go a long way.

The first season of Prison Break worked because of its clever script involving clues, red herrings and a little bit of romance. I had my doubts as to whether season two would work at all and certainly thought that they'd call it a day after that. But subsequent seasons have shown enough changes in scenery to keep us coming back for more.

Did they succeed? I think so. I'm enjoying this season as much as the others and was happy to see an old face back (and extremely sad to see one very hot face leave the show in the first episode). The reason I'm not sad about the show ending is that this is the plan. So many of my favourite shows in the past couple of years got cancellation notices in the middle of a season after struggling with ratings. Shows like The OC and Charmed had such haphazard endings that you're forever left feeling more than slightly dissatisfied with the ending.

I just get the feeling that they are ending this show when it's most logical to do so and I am really optimistic that they'll give this fine show the fantastic conclusion it deserves. It might even be an idea if they released more fixed-length television series rather than trying to resuscitate dying shows like they do and cheating fans out of decent story lines. (Oh, don't mind me - I'm just a little bitter over recent events over at Ghost Whisperer. I'll get over it).

Final gratuitous hot picture of Wentworth Miller (for now):

Speaking of which - what do you think Wentworth Miller can do now? I personally would love to see him as the love interest / conflicted demon in a supernatural thriller. I think he could do dark, conflicted and good/bad so well.

Music: The Day The Music Died

Today marks the 50th anniversary of the death of Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and The Big Bopper. 

Buddy Holly

My Dad often tells me of that fateful day on 3 February 1959 when he experienced precisely what Don McLean described in his song "American Pie". He tells me how he was doing his normal newspaper delivery round when one of the papers fell open and he saw the headline. "Buddy Holly dead" he recalls with tears in his eyes as he describes how he fell to his knees in shock.  The day the music died, indeed.

Buddy Holly was only 22 when he died but he was such a prolific recorder that his record label was able to release music for almost a decade after his death.  My favourite songs by him are "Not Fade Away" and "Well Alright".

Not Fade Away - Buddy Holly

 

My favourite song by Ritchie Valens has to be "La Bamba" and the film La Bamba was one of my favourite films when I was growing up.  I still know the Spanish words to "La Bamba" off by heart!!!

I'm not really a fan of The Big Bopper but I'd have to give his song "Chantilly Lace" mention as it is an absolute rock 'n roll classic.

Rest in peace gentlemen.  You have no idea the impact you all continue to have on music 50 years after your deaths.

Film: Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

It has been such a long time since I have unreservedly given a film a 10/10 score and I am thrilled to give Slumdog Millionaire just that. This is the uplifting story of a Mumbai teenager who has grown up in the slums and goes on to become a contestant on "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?".

The film is beautifully acted and scripted and I enjoyed every single minute of it. The cinematography is amazing and both the score and the soundtrack are beautiful. The film is two hours long but I certainly did not notice the length; in fact, I thought it was just perfect. It deserves all ten Oscar nominations, the Golden Globe for best motion picture (drama) as well as the host of other nominations and wins awarded so far.

The cast won a SAG award for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture but there are two performances which, for me, deserve mention.

Tanay Hemant Chheda is amazing in his performance as "middle" Jamal. I thought he gave a considered and tender performance and I hope we get to see more of this fine young actor in the future.

Dev Patel says that he acted in Skins for a bit of a laugh and he didn't take it too seriously. Well, after winning 7 awards and being nominated for another five (so far), I have a feeling we'll all be taking this talented young actor very seriously in the future. He is fantastic in Slumdog Millionaire.

There has been a lot of controversy about the film lately and a lot of reviewers slated the predictability of the film and it's feel-good tone. As always the question for me is whether I enjoyed the time that I spent watching the film and the answer is a resounding "yes". This is the type of film that made me fall in love with gong to the movies in the first place.

Band: The Kooks

Well, The Kooks were certainly the most played band in my collection this week (Last.fm says 187 plays). This is one of those surprising bands where you don't really realise how much you like them until you take a listen to their albums and realise you know every single song already!

The Kooks have been the darlings of Xfm for some time now (which will certainly account for me knowing all of their songs as Xfm do tend to overplay the bands they support). However, it was only when I heard their latest single "Sway" that I started to pay real attention to their music.

The song was written about their former bass player Max who had to leave the band because of his problems with drugs. If you have ever had any encounters with addicts or addiction then you'll know that the message of the song is spot on: take your time, look after yourself, do what you need to do - I will be here when you get better.

I can't really recommend one album over the other but if I had to choose, I would say that their second album Konk is slightly better. My favourite song on their first album is "I Want You" and I've just about played it to death over the past couple of weeks, alternating only with "Sway" of course. The Kooks represent the finest that indie rock has to offer at the moment and you can listen to previews of their tracks with Amazon's neat little mp3 widgets:

Or you can visit them on MySpace, Last.fm or their website.