Alpha Dog

Moving Pictures / Reviews

Changeling dir. by

It is 1920’s Los Angeles and single mother Christine Collins is trying to raise her boy. One Sat she is called in to work and when she returns home little Walter Collins is nowhere to be found. The police set about looking and eventually, after 5 months they bring him back. Only the boy they return to Christine is different; she is, however, informed that those changes are the result of her shock and the boys trauma. Why it is quite the done thing for a boy to shrink 4 inches as a result of such a horrifying encounter. And circumcised now you say? Well it is healthy, and who knows what that drifter may have been thinking. Ms. Collins is not about to rest however. She wants her boy back.

4 December 2008
Books

The Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford by

He was growing into middle age and was living then in a bungalow on Woodland Avenue. Green weeds split the porch steps, a wasp nest clung to an attic gable, a rope swing looped down from a dying elm tree and the ground below it was scuffed soft as flour.

I think this is one of the rare cases where watching the film version improves your enjoyment of the novel. Maybe because for certain passages I could really here the narrator from the film while I was reading. I think that this might make an excellent audio book. Then again, I’ve never listened to an audio book, so what do I know.

23 April 2008
Moving Pictures / Reviews

There Will Be Blood dir. by

It is hard to know how to describe this film. It is more of a character study than a story. Of course there is some plot, an oilman and his desire to suceed, but the story isn’t too important. What is important is the character of Daniel Plainview, as played by Oscar winning Daniel Day-Lewis.

The opening scenes show just how driven Daniel is. We watch him, working on his own, in a mine. No dialogue at all for around 15 minutes, just this man in a hole, digging, dynamiting up the earth, falling down the hole, injured and yet still having the drive to pull himself out of that hole and struggle back into town to get his bit of dirt evaluated.

7 March 2008
Moving Pictures / Reviews

I am legend [based on the book] by dir. by

After the end of the world as we know it Robert Neville lives in New York. All alone apart from his dog, Sam, he drives around hunting deer, chatting to mannequins and going through the stock of a local video store. He also makes sure to be home and locked away by the time night comes. Because at night the rest of the survivors come out. And they aren’t so friendly.

19 January 2008
Moving Pictures / Reviews

Enchanted dir. by

Enchanted is the story of Giselle, who meets her true love, Prince Edward after he rescues her from a troll. Or maybe an ogre. But before they seal their relationship with...

18 December 2007
Books

Fool Moon by

ISBN: 1841493996 Book two in The Dresden Files read for the RIP Challenge I never used to keep close track of the phases of the moon Harry Dresden is a wizard....

6 September 2007
Books

Time and Again by

See also: LibraryThing | SFF Masterworks | Andy’s Anachronisms | Books you never read | Thoughts on writing and other afflictions | Book reviews by Emma | MADreads In shirt-sleeves, the...

1 August 2007
Moving Pictures / Reviews

A Little Princess [based on the book] by dir. by

based on book by Frances Hodgson Burnett.
Sara Crewe lives a spoiled life in India with a devoted, doting father, until World War I intervenes, and he enlists, sending Sara off to boarding school in New York to keep her safe. There she must adjust, whereas before she had free rein to do as she pleased, now she must submit to rules and regulations that she doesn’t understand. And, most difficult for her, she must keep her imagination in check. But Sara isn’t a selfish, “poor little rich girl”, she is bright and kind, and soon makes friends with most of the other girls, from those in her class to the scullery maid. She is also the only one who can really get through to Lottie as they have both lost their mothers.

29 July 2007
Moving Pictures / Reviews

Zodiac [based on the book] by dir. by

This is based on the true story of a serial killer in the 1970’s in California who highlighted his murders with cryptic letters to newspapers. He killed at random, and called himself The Zodiac, and wrote his letters in a code. He also often sent bloodstained items of clothes along with these letters as a sort of proof. He was never caught. Robert Graysmith was working as a cartoonist at one of the newspapers where the letters arrived, and became caught up in the case. The film is based on his book of the events of the time.

17 June 2007
Moving Pictures / Reviews

Alpha Dog dir. by

You know this film isn’t half bad. I went to see it expecting a somewhat mindless popcorn film. But is actually a fairly watchable, half way decent flick.

Johnny Truelove and his pals are half-arsed weed-dealer-kids, hanging out and doing drugs, making money through dealing. But when real bad-boy Jake Mazursky owes money to Truelove things begin to escalate, leading to Truelove and “his boys” kidnapping Jake’s half brother. But the 15 year old Zack doesn’t seem like much of a victim. He gets to live the life of drugs, drink and parties; he is having a good time. But the kidnapping was a spur of the moment thing, and when he consults his lawyer Truelove realises that the implications may be quite serious.

17 May 2007
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