Susan Hated Literature

Dir: Martin Scorsese
Writ: William Monahan based on previous screenplay by Siu Fai Mak & Felix Chong

• Leonardo DiCaprio - Billy Costigan
• Matt Damon - Colin Sullivan
• Jack Nicholson - Frank Costello
• Mark Wahlberg - Dignam
• Martin Sheen - Oliver Queenan
• Ray Winstone - Mr. French
• [Alec Baldwin - Ellerby

It took me a while, but I finally managed to go see this film last night, and now I want to go again, because it really is fantastic. Bloody, violent, full of no-good nastiness and general scumbaggery. But wonderful to watch all the same.

The film begins “some years ago” where we see a young Colin Sullivan being approached by local bad-guy-boss Costello and groomed to join the police force and become a mole. Billy Costigan also joins the police force, but he is sent out as an undercover cop to infiltrate Costello’s gang. Sullivan meanwhile has succeeded in rising through the force and is now doing the exact opposite, infiltrating the police for Costello’s benefit.

Thematically the film is mainly concerned with betrayal and family and loyalty. Both DiCaprio and Damon are playing the character of a rat, but in very different ways, and I’d have to say that DiCaprio plays it better. Or maybe just got the better role. Damon is great as the cocky, upwardly mobile cop, but it is DiCaprio’s character who has more emotion and development to explore.

All the acting is top-notch, though on occasion I thought Nicholson went a little over the top. It could be argued that his character is over the top, so we’ll let it go. It is two and half hours of a great film, you won’t notice the time passing at all.

IMDb | Scathing reviews for Bitchy People | Scanners | Random Burblings

Related posts

• We Own the Night (7)
• The Aviator (0)
• Miami Vice (4)
• Gone Baby Gone (9)
• Zodiac (0)

I’ve remembered what it was that it was that I was going to post yesterday but then didn’t, cause I forgot what it was. And what it was about was Wife Swap. yes I know, reality TV is the bottom of the barrel, and Wife Swap is really very contrived, with its searching out couples whose lifestyles and personal philosophies are so opposed. But still, its contrived tension and conflict is entertaining. It is much better than the US version, Trading Spouses with their over the top narration, and the importance placed on money. I’m sure that the Wife Swap couples get money, why else would you do it, but it isn’t mentioned and isn’t such a big deal throughout the show.

Watching Wife Swap really makes you wonder about people, and how its possible that ordinary everyday people can hold such beliefs, or be so arrogant and selfish that they can’t see that other people have every right to behave in a different manner to them. I know that the shows are probably edited to make certain circumstances look worse, but letting your nine year old daughter drink alcohol is probably not such a good idea. And letting her drink Wicked is a really bad one. I mean, a glass of watered wine at a meal isn’t going to do much damage is it? But starting a kid on alco-pops?

But what makes it really interesting is that you can see that some people do actually change. And that they may put up a front of “I’m right. You’re fucked up” but they do learn something.

And sometimes you see that there are really nice people out there. One of the husbands^[1] in this week’s show was just such a decent fella. It was strange, normally they start out okay but then turn a bit nasty. Or are a bit horrible from the start, but this one was just nice all the way through. I don’t mean that he didn’t have arguments with the swappee, because he did. And he was the father who thought it was okay for his daughter to drink Wicked. But at the same time it was so obvious that he was doing what he thought was right. And he was just a nice bloke.

Mind you, maybe it was in comparison with the other husband, who wasn’t totally awful, but he was very much in the “I’m right, the world is wrong” mold. He and his wife had uprooted their family and lived on a remote part of some island, because they’d seen the modern world and didn’t like it. Fair enough, be that way, but then why volunteer for a show when you know you are going to have someone with very different views come into your home. And their attitude to cursing was pretty Victorian. What is so wrong with an occasional wanker But I suppose getting a fluffy pink, hard, drinking, cursing swapee was a bit of a shock to his system.

Does all this mean I’ve changed my mind on reality TV? Will I now be tuning in to Big Brother when, the adverts tell me, it starts soon. Hell no! BB is the evil spawn of a soul-sucking, personality-destroying celebrity demon. It is piss. And can someone please explain how watching people sleep is now regarded as entertainment?^[2]

Reality tv is rarely actually real. It is all set-up and pretend, but every now and then real life will actually peep through, and that is when it is good tv.

And don’t you just love Ray Winstone? There is a great interview with him in The Observer, and his new film All In The Game which is said to boast one of the highest expletive counts on film

we had a meeting with the Channel 4 producer about a week before we started shooting and he had the script and there were about a thousand stickers in it - blue, yellow, green, pink - and I said “What’s all that?”, and he said, green is fucking, yellow is cunt, blue is racial abuse or whatever, and he said, “We should have a cunt reduction.”

Related posts

• You think that I could muster up a little soft, shoop devil sway (7)
• you can’t catch me, I’m the Gingerbread man (4)
• Whats left to say (4)
• Week 248 (3)
• Week 201 (6)

• Guy Pearce - Charlie Burns
• Emily Watson - Martha Stanley
• Ray Winstone - Captain Stanley
• David Wenham - Eden Fletcher

Sometimes you go to the cinema hoping for a good film, but thinking that what you are about to watch isn’t going to be fun, it may not even qualify as entertainment. The Proposition written by Nick Cave had that sort of an aura to it.

An Australian western, about a brother possibly heading into the outback to kill a brother in order to save another brother. A western that has far more in common with the violent realism of Unforgiven rather than the over the top, almost cartoon violence of some other westerns. It often makes for hard viewing.

None of the characters are the sort you’d want to take home and meet the family. Arthur Burns is a psychopath, middle brother Charlie took part in a robbery turned rape turned murder before leaving his elder brother. The police officer, Ray Winston’e Captain Stanley is the sort of man who would use one brother against another in an attempt to “civilise the land.” But at the same time you can sympathise with some of the characters, to a certain extent. Seeing Stanley with his wife won’t help you forgive some of his actions, but it does offer a sympathetic side. Likewise, Charlie’s desire to protect his younger brother Mike shows a less violence aspect to his character.

The great cast of actors are matched by some wonderful cinematography. The camera work doesn’t really make you want to go and live in the sand and grit, but it does convey the beauty and harshness of the landscape. And the amount of flies.

There is plenty of violence, and you see the effects, although it only rated a 16s here in Ireland, despite the censor’s warning of strong gory explicit violence. There are no bloodless deaths, nor off screen departures here. Everything is very sudden, and very real. And combining this with the occasional bit of poetical dialogue and the soundtrack makes for a great film. You will have to be in the right frame of mind to watch this film, but I’d highly recommend it.

IMDb | Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds | Phil on Film | Random Burblings | world of mass

Related posts

• Rome 1.11 & 1.12 (2)
• Rome - Season 1 (4)
• Pan’s Labyrinth (3)
• 300 (6)
• 1610: A Sundial In A Grave (0)

That is The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe for those of you trying to figure out the abbreviation.

• Georgie Henley - Lucy Pevensie
• Skandar Keynes - Edmund Pevensie
• William Moseley - Peter Pevensie
• Anna Popplewell - Susan Pevensie
• Tilda Swinton - White Witch
• Liam Neeson - Aslan (voice)
• Ray Winstone - Mr. Beaver (voice)
• Dawn French - Mrs. Beaver (voice)
• Rupert Everett - Fox (voice)

I really wanted to love this film. I can remember reading the books, and I really enjoyed the BBC version from ages ago. Trouble is that this never seemed to get the balance right. It didn’t feel slow at the start, with the build-up as the film established the children’s characters and relationships, but considering how much goes on maybe this time could’ve been put to better use later on in the film. The children’s relationship with Aslan felt rushed, imo, and lacking in emotion.

Continue Reading »

Related posts

• The Golden Compass (4)
• War of the Worlds (2)
• Underworld: Evolution (5)
• The Lake House (9)
• Stardust (7)

For those of you who don’t know, Neil Gaiman is involved in bringing the story of Beowulf to the big screen. And the cast, imo, sounds great so far; Ray Winstone, Brendan Gleeson, Anthony Hopkins, Angelina Jolie and others. Of course they won’t be seen on the screen as performance capture technology is being used to create the film. Not motion capture. That is something entirely different.

But it seems as though there is more than a little discontent in the Beowulf-loving community, with phrases like “spitting on your grandmother” and insults such as “overly literal twit” being bandied around. Has madness really taken over the Anglo-Saxon community?

Related posts

• I love (0)
• you came to take us, all things go, all things go (8)
• Will getting my book signed by an author in the flesh make me pregnant (0)
• Troy (0)
• The Village (5)

dir. Antoine Fuqua
Starring:
* Clive Owen - Arthur
* Keira Knightly - Guinivere
* Ioan Gruffudd - Lancelot
* Ray Winstone - Bors

This film suffered from many poor reviews. Both from critics and, in my case, from friends who found it boring. Course I don’t read reviews before I go see films, I try to make up my own mind. Still I wasn’t expecting a lot from this film.
I’ve never really been a huge fan of Arthur films. First Knight was really really crap, imo, and Excaliber was a bit wierd. Plus there is the whole Monty Python thing

So why’d I go to see it? Continue Reading »

Related posts

• Robin of Sherwood (0)
• Tristan & Isolde (4)
• The Wandering Fire (0)
• The Sunne in Splendour (2)
• The Summer Tree (0)

Series created by Richard Carpeneter
* Michael Praed - Robin of Loxely
* Jason Connery - Robert of Huntington
* Clive Mantle - Little John
* Ray Winstone - Will Scarlett
* Nickolas Grace - Sheriff of Nottingham
* Judi Trott - Marion
* Robert Adie - Guy of Gisburne
* Phil Rose - Tuck
* Mark Ryan - Nasir
* Peter Llewllyn Williams - Much
* Philip Jackson - Abbot Hugo
* John Abineri - Herne the Hunter

I don’t know if I actually remember this from when it was originally shown on RTE, or if it was repeats. Then again, the last series, the third, was made in 1985. I was six then, so it is entirely possible that I have vague memories. But I don’t really remember watching much telly back then, we spent most of our time outside running round the estate. So it is more likely that I remember repeats. I know I watched Robin of Sherwood on a Sat. because I used to go horse-riding after it when I was in secondary school.
It doesn’t really matter, the fact that does is that I have very fond memories of Robin of Sherwood so when I spotted the first two series on DVD two years ago I barely hesitated before purchasing. Continue Reading »

Related posts

• King Arthur (0)
• The Proposition (4)
• Pan’s Labyrinth (3)
• Ladyhawke (0)
• You ain’t so bad, you ain’t so bad, you ain’t nothin’. C’mon, champ, hit me in the face! My mom hits harder than you! (5)