Each year I write this post for two reasons: 1) to show how much I don’t really care about the nominees (not really true) and 2) do quickie reviews of the nominated movies that I haven’t already reviewed separately. Back when there were fewer Best Picture noms, I tried to watch all of them by…
Category: (4.5 out of 5)
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time – Theatre Review (National Theatre Live @ Cineplex)
The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon is one of my favourite novels. Imagine my delight to learn that not only was the book being made into a play, but that the play was going to be performed by the National Theatre in London, and that the performance was going…
Movie #50: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
First let’s establish that I couldn’t get past a few pages of the Stieg Larsson novel; and I viewed-but-didn’t-enjoy the original Swedish film featuring Noomi Rapace (who I did enjoy watching). Nevertheless, I was excited when I heard that The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo was being remade in English by director David Fincher (whose…
Movie #37: Moneyball
First off, I am no sports fan (and sports movies are not high on my list either), but a friend suggested that Moneyball was good enough that I might enjoy it anyway — and he was right. Brad Pitt plays Billy Beane, a former pro baseball player who became the general manager of the Oakland…
Movie #30: My Week With Marilyn
Starting out as the young, misunderstood, blonde, Jen Lindley on Dawson’s Creek, it’s interesting how Michelle Williams has come full circle to play the ultimate young misunderstood blonde as Marilyn Monroe in My Week With Marilyn. I’m not really a Marilyn fan, being that of her movies I’ve only seen Some Like It Hot, but…
Some Nights by fun. – Music Review
Last week I was trawling through iTunes, when I noticed Some Nights by the American band simply called “fun.” making its way to the top of the charts. I liked their previous mega-hit “We Are Young” so I decided to give it a preview, and I loved it! When I also tried the rest of…
Movie #14: Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol
Following a recent trend in sequel naming convention, the fourth in the Mission: Impossible action movie series decided to leave off the serial number and go with a subtitle instead. Ironically, the “Ghost protocol” has only a minor role in setting up the dire straits that IMF Agent Ethan Hunt (played again by the “he’s…
Movie #12: 50/50
I should probably watch more movies about people with serious illness. Despite my usual resentment of manipulation, I am always moved by these kinds of films. 50/50 is definitely an example of an “illness movie” done right. Joseph Gordon-Levitt gives a good performance in almost anything (I want to say that playing a ridiculous Cobra…
Movie #6: Real Steel
I am no fan of boxing movies, so I was pretty sure that the gimmick of having robots doing the fighting wasn’t going to make me enjoy Real Steel any better. The stories in boxing movies are always predictable: underdog rising-star makes it good, suffers set-back, then comes back for the win; all the while…
Alvin's Adventures in Pop Culture 