It’s been a few years since I read Jonathan Safran Foer’s Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close. It’s a book that I enjoyed while reading, but it hasn’t particularly stayed with me. I read it, liked it, moved on. It had totally left my radar until I saw the trailer….
Miranda Hart to offer advice to young people
21 September 2011 by 2 Comments
I adore comedian and actress Miranda Hart. She’s awkward, funny, intelligent and the kind of woman I’d love to be friends with. Or at least that’s the public persona she has created and which the country has fallen for in the past couple of years. It was announced a couple of days ago that she’ll be writing an advice book…
J. Edgar Trailer
20 September 2011 by Leave a Comment
We’re now well into the back half of the year and it’s time for the Oscar contenders to start rearing their heads and making their pitches for glory. Clint Eastwood’s latest assault on the Academy is J. Edgar…
1Q84 – The New Harry Potter?
16 September 2011 by Leave a Comment
In hype terms at least there’s a similarity. Japanese author Haruki Murakami’s cult trilogy 1Q84 is coming to the UK and US next month and already there’s a big buzz surrounding the release. Over 1 million copies were sold in Japan in just two months and high sales are also expected in Western markets.
Colin Firth Joins The Railway Man
15 September 2011 by 1 Comment
Not content with an Oscar for his portrayal of a stuttering King, Colin Firth is once again turning to a period drama which as awards-bait written all over it. Based on a true story Firth will star in The Railway Man as Eric Lomax, a former POW who searches for his captors decades after his experiences on the “death railway” between Thailand and Burma. This is likely to appeal to Academy voters – we all know there’s nothing guaranteed to stir them more than a little World War II tragedy.
Rent a book on your Kindle?
15 September 2011 by 1 Comment
According to The Telegraph, Amazon is currently in talks with publishers to launch a digital book rental service similar to Netflix. For an annual fee readers will have access to a huge number of ebooks. Sounds like another nail in the coffin for both the traditional printed book and the library service as we know it….
Moneyball Trailer
14 September 2011 by 4 Comments
Moneyball is Brad Pitt’s latest film and I must admit when I heard about it I wasn’t that interested. Pitt stars as the coach of a poverty-stricken baseball team who turns to a computer programmer to help identify which players he needs to buy. Sound good? No not to me either but the trailer has made me wonder. Pitt appears to be in charismatic form as the determined coach and I am now beginning to see the appeal of Moneyball.
Ghosts of Empire
14 September 2011 by Leave a Comment
I don’t venture out of the world of fiction very often – when I do it’s mostly to biographies or textbooks for my Open University course, but a new history book by a local Member of Parliament has caught my eye. Spelthorne’s Conservative MP Kwasi Kwarteng has explored Britain’s Imperial past in Ghosts of Empire: Britain’s Legacies in the Modern World. Kwarteng comes from a right-of-centre political background so it’s likely that he’ll offer a different point of view to that in the majority of historical texts out there.
Can Cancer Be Funny?
14 September 2011 by 2 Comments
It’s a thorny subject which can polarise opinions. Is it appropriate to create comic responses to tragic events? Should we really look for the funny side of something that isn’t in any way amusing? Where do we draw the line between edgy humour and being offensive…
Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe confirmed for Les Mis
13 September 2011 by Leave a Comment
Producer Cameron Mackintosh has confirmed that Hugh Jackman and Russell Crowe will star in the film version of Les Miserables. As you know, my love for Les Mis knows no bounds so I’m slightly worried. I like Hugh Jackman and providing Crowe is a good singer he could make a wonderfully intense Javert, but the idea of celebrity casting trumping genuine musical talent is disturbing. Still, Working Title, Cameron Mackintosh and director Tom Hooper have a decent record – it could be all right. We’ll find out in December 2012.