Rocky Horror: can't beat a classic!

Last night, after discovering that not one but TWO of my gals had not seen Rocky Horror, they were told to come over and bring the wine and choccies. The response was a mixed one. One loved the film and was very impressed while the other, a little stumped, wasn't actually sure if she liked it or not. Me and my lil big sis, having seen it on numerous occasions were of course forcing ourselves not to sing along (too much) and laugh before lines had been uttered.


As my sister rightly said, Tim Curry is quite simply the sexiest man ever to be seen in drag (his legs are envied by women the world over I'm sure!) and Richard O'Brien of Crystal Maze fame is fantastic as both the creative genius (he wrote the original stage play!) and Riff-raff. Other stars include Susan Sarandon and Meatloaf.

To explain the plot would defeat the point of seeing the film. It is beyond strange but has brilliant songs including the infamous TimeWarp and acting that has never been seen before or since that manages to be brilliant and cheesy and terrible all at the same time.


It's genius is in the outlandish outfits, un-PC characters (they hail from  a place called Transexual, Transylvania) and the fantastic one liners! "Dammit Janet, I love you", "It's not easy having a good time, even smiling makes my face ache", "That's a rather tender subject. Another slice, anyone?" and "I've been makin' a man, with blond hair, and a tan and he's good for relieving my tension."


The films title in Argentina translates to "Orgy of horror and craziness" a fairly accurate summary actually :)


So go and watch it as soon as you can and don't just sit around and wait in antici....




















































































....pation :)


LE xx

4/5

Whisper from an Angel by Christine Holohan

As a recent convert to the world of non-fiction, I understand the trepidation many readers might have about branching away from the fun-filled land of fiction and into the real world. What I would suggest to those who are a little hesitant is to start with a memoir or two. Memoirs are written in the same narrative style as fiction but with the added bonus of knowing that what you are reading is not made up. Someone out there lived what you are reading and that for me gives it meaning. Think of how many times you have watched a film and reached the credits only to find that it is based on a true story. Did it change the way you looked at the film?

Now the only thing you need to ask yourself is what are you interested in - what gets you excited in a book and in life? Some people may love the celebrity world and thoroughly enjoy biographies, while others may have experienced some form of abuse and are comforted to know they are not alone in the world, choosing to find solace and inspiration in books about abuse victims who have managed to triumph in one way or another. For me, I'm just interested in a gripping story. I admit I am a sucker for a happy ending or some sort of resolution but all in all, I need a good struggle and a way out of that struggle if a story is going to keep me interested.

...which leads me onto this book. Whisper from an Angel tells the story of its author, Christine Holohan, who has seen spirits as far back as she can remember and has communicated with them for most of her life. What makes the book so compelling is the incredible way this gift (or curse as she often sees it herself) has transformed her life in ways even she, a psychic, could not foresee. It is horrifying to think that she saw visions of people dying before it happened but was unable to stop it and that she was haunted by ghosts in her everyday life, affecting her attempts at work and relationships.

This reached its pinacle when she was visited by an angry female spirit who had just been murdered. Christine found herself trying to relay the details of the murder, which she had been forced to relive through the eyes of the spirit, to the sceptical police who were investigating the crime in an attempt to help them find the murderer. Her involvement in the case would not be as brief and resolute as she hoped and she would be plagued by its events for a long time after. In the midst of this horror she found comfort in family and friends who never ridiculed her for her abilities and remained loyal.

Christine writes in an incredibly open and honest way about her own personal struggles. I only found a tiny part at the end slightly preachy but it didn't bother me. Christine mearly shows the reader how her spirituality has helped her through her life and offers her opinion on guardian angels and how they are around us trying to guide us and keep us on the right path. Whether you choose to believe that or not is up to you.

Obviously, if you are something of a cynic and don't believe in anything you cannot see or touch then this may not be the book for you but I personally found its mix of spirituality, personal struggle and crime solving a winning formula.

Christine - I applaud you for such a brave book. Well done.

LE xx

3.5/5

The Black Swan

In case you have been living on Mars for the last few weeks, this is a fairly straight-forward plot. Natalie Portman plays Nina, the very talented ballerina on the cusp of becoming the prima ballerina - if only she could loosen up enough to play both the black and white swan in the company's production of Swan Lake, as the role is typically played by the same person.

It might seem straight-forward on the surface but this plot is anything but. You will by now have heard all the Oscar talk and let me just say it is deserved. Natalie Portman, who can do no wrong - let's be honest, has never been this good. She is jaw-droppingly good in this and her gradual descent into the land of crazy is gripping and intoxicating.

But (yes there is a but) what the people failed to warn us poor innocent viewers is that this film is grotesque! I am not easily shocked but had to look away on a number of occasions as graphically violent and vulgar scenes unravelled before my eyes. It still makes me shiver thinking of her pulling at the skin she has cut by her finger. Certainly not for the faint-hearted. Or perhaps if you are faint-hearted and really want to see it then take someone who has seen it already and they can warn you when to look away.

Let me just say that despite its moments of grotesque, this film is the best film I have seen in YEARS yes years! I was gripped from start to finish, compelled by whether what I was seeing on screen was really happening or was simply in Nina's head. By the end, I was past caring either way - it was just that good to watch. Much like Nina, I was left hungry and thirsty for more. It certainly stayed with me long after I left the cinema *I currently have the Swan Lake score playing on Spotify!*. Oh and the ballet sequences are spectacular too!

What made The King's Speech so brilliant was it's phenomenal cast and personable characters. The whole film was very real and character based. In total contrast, what makes this film so brilliant is it's descent into the imagined, the sinister, the theatrical and the very very dark mind of Nina.

Helping her along her journey into darkness is the fantastic Mila Kunis (more widely known as the voice of Meg in Family Guy!) who is funny and brilliant in her own right. She easily captures the black swan role from the outset, being as good as Nina but more relaxed, more cool, less clinically perfect. Nina finds herself both drawn to her new rival and angered by her as she sees her as her threat and how their relationship develops is simply incredible on both parts.

So brace yourselves but definitely go and see it - go and see it right now and then go home and put on the soundtrack and then perhaps go and see a ballet - they're not appreciated nearly as much as they should be.

LE xx

P.S Little footnote to the boys - if you get 'dragged' along to this by lady friends, reluctantly agree because that's just how nice you are - there's a nice little treat for you in there, trust me :)


Rating: 5 out of 5 FOBLES 

Songs of a Humpback Whale by Jodi Picoult

Picoult has, by a large, found a niche and stuck with it and it has not failed her. Her books always raise ethical and moral dilemmas and explore what different people might do in different situations. Over her many books, she has explored religion, heart transplants, murder, choosing between children and even rape and abuse.

So, having read My Sister’s Keeper, I found it interesting to go back to where it all began – her first book. And it did not disappoint. Songs of a Humpback Whale has all the trademarks of a Picoult – brilliantly written and totally flawed and relatable characters within a complex plot with a strong emotional pull.

The main difference is that this book is much simpler in its drama. There is no massive life or death dilemma. The action, as it were, has already happened. We learn early on that Jane, the main protagonist, was abused as a child by her father and escaped into marriage at a young age. The reader also discovers at the very beginning that their daughter Rebecca survived a plane crash, aged 3. These two massive events are what, directly and indirectly, lead to Jane leaving her husband with her daughter in tow and that is when the book really begins. Her husband is a workaholic (a leader in his field of Whale song - hence the title) and has spent years neglecting his family with his absence. After a fight, Jane has had enough and runs.

Picoult is more subtle in this book, but equally brilliant. She explores in great depth the relationships between family members and the hazards of believing first impressions. She jumps perspectives from character to character and time, leaping between past, present and future events - but the fundamentals are not lost along the way. The characters are so well written that they leaped off the page and became my friends - ultimately I just wanted to know how their lives were going to pan out.

The book is more adult than I was expecting, as both Jane and Rebecca learn about new loves and go on their own paths of self-discovery in a very detailed and often explicit way so perhaps not for much younger readers.

Personally, I think it is a true testament to the readability of a book that even when the end is revealed in the middle, the reader still wants to continue reading simply to discover how it reached that point. And I did. It is that compelling.

A must for any Picoult fan, and for any readers who want to try her it would be a great place to start.

Enjoy! LE xx

3.5/5

The Ghost (writer)

A clever, well written political thriller with Pierce Brosnan and Ewan McGregor as the two male leads and the fabulous Olivia Williams and Kim Cattrall supporting. Ewan's character is enlisted to be a ghost writer for Brosnan's ex-Prime Minister and his soon to be released memoirs after his previous ghost-writer mysteriously commits suicide. Clever plot + and great cast = success... right? Wrong.

Annoyingly, the powers that be decided that Ewan should have a cockney-esque London accent and Pierce Brosnan, the well spoken Brit, apparently needed to sound more upper class so was given a weird twang that wasn't quite the Queen but seemed to try. To rub salt into the wound, they then decided to make Kim Cattrall British. Oh dear.

I can appreciate that you can be so set on having a particular actor in a role that you disregard the fact that they are a different nationality to the one in the script. And normally, this is not an issue. Ewan was tolerable as Obi-Wan and even kind of cute in I Love you Philip Morris. And there are actors who can do very good accents and it works brilliantly. Brosnan himself did a fab American accent (Americans may disagree) in Remember Me, as did Robert Pattinson in the same film. In fact, the films main cast were British and Australian but they all did fantastic American accents and it wasn't remotely distracting.

In this film, however, it was all I could focus on for the first half hour! I spent the first ten minutes trying to figure out where Ewan's character was meant to be from. My issue is that I don't understand why they bothered? It's not based on a true story (well not officially anyway!) and he needed to be British not a Londoner. So what is wrong with his natural (and very sexy) Scottish accent? And why change Brosnan's accent when he is so suave and typically British that he managed to play a very convincing Bond in his 50s?! Why change so many things that are wholly unnecessary when all it does is distract from the plot?

That being said, once you get past this point you start to appreciate the subtle brilliance of this film. The plot is actually very good and offers everything you might want from a political thriller - intrigue, backstabbing, volatile and sneaky personalities, car chases and the long-suffering but totally loyal assistant to the man in charge. It keeps you guessing right up to the very end and is compelling as Ewan takes the viewer along his road of discovery.

Olivia Williams remains, in my humble opinion, one of Britain's most understated and brilliant actresses in a manipulative and unhinged role which should have been nominated for an Oscar, had the film done better on general release.

Certainly worth a watch - but perhaps wait for TV.

LE xx

3/5

Heath Ledger Tribute (1979-2008)

I was shocked this morning to see that it has been 3 years today since Heath Ledger's untimely death. He was a rarety amongst young actors, doing a bizarre mixture of film genres and roles within them and all his fans were expecting great things from him in the years to come. So it came as a great shock to discover that he had died aged only 28.

Ledger first hit the big screen back in 1999 in the modern take of a Shakespearean classic 10 Things I Hate About You with Julia Stiles. Since then, he has managed to captivate audiences in (among others) A Knights Tale, Brokeback Mountain and perhaps most famously The Dark Knight, where his role as the joker was talked about as the greatest role of his career and rewarded with numerous awards and nominations (all sadly received posthumously by relatives).

For me, my favourite of his roles is that of William Thatcher in A Knights Tale where he, a pauper, is told by his father to "reach for the stars". His quest to make something of his life and become a knight against all odds was both medieval and modern, sad and funny. And when others would have given up, Thatcher never ceased in his efforts and was ultimately rewarded for his persistence. It is a brilliant film with a fantastic supporting cast, including the phenomenal Paul Brittany, and managed somehow to make a soppy period romance cool and hip.

Ledger was clearly adamant that he didn't want to be type-cast as the pretty boy, choosing to take on roles that showcased his acting talent and not just his pretty face (though for this fan, the pretty face certainly helped) and dealt with serious roles with a maturity many other young actors would not have been able to pull off.

So here's to you, Heath Ledger, and all the brilliant films you should have made.

LE xx

Worst film ever made/book ever written?

So far, all my blog entries have been upbeat and merely offering my 2 cents on the books and films I have been enjoying - and whether I think you might like them or not. But today, my mood is evidently a little darker than usual as all I can think of is the worst films I have ever seen.


Now there have been many films that I have patiently sat through waiting for the plot to improve and then reached the ending still waiting for an improvement. Others have been - well in the words of Simon Cowell "forgettable" (and of course not one springs to mind).
There is, however, one film that sticks in my head because it is the only film that has ever made me want to leave a cinema - sadly I chose to stay. That film is AI. 


What started as a dark look at technological advancement in the not so distant future turned into a search by a little robot boy for his mamma.  Sadly, the original director Stanley Kubrick, died while making this movie and his friend Steven Spielberg took on the role. 
What resulted was quite clearly 2 completely different takes on the same plot merged into one abysmal film - shocking as that may be as both directors are legendary and have done some of the best films in American cinema history! But here's why it flopped in my eyes...


Kubrick saw it as dark because in his vision, humans were replacing their children with robots. The couple in question have a dying child so decide to replace him (charming!) with a robot child. Then *oops* their real child starts getting better and doesn't take too kindly to his rival. So the robot boy goes a bit doolally trying to get the attention and affection he craves from his human parents.


Spielberg (genius that he is) saw it a little differently. He imagined that the real plot lay with the poor little robot boy, shunned by his human parents, desperate to be loved and accepted and on a quest to become a real boy (Pinocchio anyone?!) - so he takes the abandoned boy on a journey to find his creator.


There is a clear shift half way through and it is unsettling to watch it go from one to the other. To this day, it angers me that I will never get those 146 minutes back.


LE x