January diversions
Films: Doing well so far, saw eight films in January, brief comments over on 52filmchallenge:
The Time Machine
Daybreakers
Max Payne
Up In The Air
The Day The Earth Stood Still
Con-Air
Sunset Boulevard
Inkheart
Books: The Victoria Vanishes, Christopher Fowler: the sixth Bryant and May book. Really not bad at all, but the constant "gosh, Arthur Bryant is terribly old and dysfunctional" along with "they're really going to close down the Peculiar Crimes Unit this time" shtick is getting a bit stale. Irritatingly, the Big Mystery (a pub into which one of the victims is seen entering apparently vanishes overnight) is hand-waved away with a few implausible sentences, but the main story is handled rather better.
TV: Big Bang Theory is back and being as funny and nerdy as ever (there are still far too many jokes that I wish I didn't understand). NCIS was back after the Christmas break, and being the usual mix of fluff and seriousness. I've started watching Without A Trace recently, because I can't get enough police procedurals, and this isn't a bad one, as these things go (New York FBI missing person's unit, rather than homicide, so much less emphasis on forensics and more on asking the right questions. CSI, yay. Back and kicking ass (even had some proper continuity, when Catherine alluded to Sara's vegetarianism in the context of an experiment on a pig corpse). Nurse Jackie is a dark and compelling series about an ER nurse, married with two kids, having an affair with a man who doesn't know she's married, hooked on painkillers... it's better than it sounds. And finally, Being Human has restarted, and is as much a mediocre mix as ever. Annie is very definitely the most annoying character on TV; she's so weak and male-centric that I'd prefer they didn't bother with female characters if this is how they write them.
Music: No live music this month, but I've been listening to Paolo Nuntini's new album Sunny Side UP, which in theory I should hate, but actually love.
Theatre After only going to the theatre twice last year, I've been twice already this year \o/ First up,The 39 Steps, an excellent comedy adaptation, featuring a cast of four, slapstick, shadow theatre, more Hitchcock references than you can shake a stick at, and much fourth-wall breaking. TBH, the slapstick got a bit much towards the end, but otherwise this was a huge amount of fun. It's on tour round the UK; highly recommended if you can make it. The second one was Really Old, Like Forty-Five, at the National in London last weekend. Billed as a comedy look at our attitudes to old age and ageing, it was a real curate's egg. Couldn't make it's mind up whether to be a drama with some humour, or a comedy laced with seriousness, it managed to fail on both counts, alternating a dark, heart-rending tragedy with farcical slapstick. Patchy acting too. It;s still in preview, so might improve by the time it starts in earnest.
Travel: We took advantage of a good hotel deal, and spent the weekend in London. Biting cold but bright and sunny, we had a great time :-)
Miscellanea: Speaking of which, we finally got around to visiting the Tate Britain, which was really rather good. I had not expected to see so much modern art (OK, so some of it was rubbish - a length of rope thrown on the floor isn't art, really, no matter how many sand-stuff blue canvas cones you place in the vicinity - but there was much that was excellent, including the Pop Art room, and collections by Gilbert & George, Andy Warhol, and Bridget Riley. Some of the older stuff was pretty good too :-p Then off to Tate Modern, which I wish I was as enthused by. Sadly, Surrealism is never going to light my fire (no, a couple of black wavy lines and a patch of white emulsion on blue poster paper is not a deeply symbolic representation of nature, really), but the whole collection seemed lacklustre. The one highlight - and worth the fiver for the boat down the river by itself - was How It Is by Miroslaw Balka. This is a huge 13x30 metre box, with matt black walls, floor and ceiling. As you walk into it, the blackness envelops you, it's difficult to describe the *completeness* of the blackness. The room is full of people, so you slow to shuffling, unable to tell the difference between people moving a few feet in front of you, and the echoes of imprints on your eyes, appearing and fading like ghosts. At one point a man walked just a foot or so in front of me and I have no idea if the little girl walking next to him actually existed. If you get a chance, go visit this. And finally, we went to see the Cabinet War Rooms, which is the underground offices just off Whitehall from where Churchill ran the war. It's a fascinating look at Civil Service and Military office life in the middle of the last century. It isn't cheap, but is well worth a visit (we spent about three hours there, and could have spent longer).
The Time Machine
Daybreakers
Max Payne
Up In The Air
The Day The Earth Stood Still
Con-Air
Sunset Boulevard
Inkheart
Books: The Victoria Vanishes, Christopher Fowler: the sixth Bryant and May book. Really not bad at all, but the constant "gosh, Arthur Bryant is terribly old and dysfunctional" along with "they're really going to close down the Peculiar Crimes Unit this time" shtick is getting a bit stale. Irritatingly, the Big Mystery (a pub into which one of the victims is seen entering apparently vanishes overnight) is hand-waved away with a few implausible sentences, but the main story is handled rather better.
TV: Big Bang Theory is back and being as funny and nerdy as ever (there are still far too many jokes that I wish I didn't understand). NCIS was back after the Christmas break, and being the usual mix of fluff and seriousness. I've started watching Without A Trace recently, because I can't get enough police procedurals, and this isn't a bad one, as these things go (New York FBI missing person's unit, rather than homicide, so much less emphasis on forensics and more on asking the right questions. CSI, yay. Back and kicking ass (even had some proper continuity, when Catherine alluded to Sara's vegetarianism in the context of an experiment on a pig corpse). Nurse Jackie is a dark and compelling series about an ER nurse, married with two kids, having an affair with a man who doesn't know she's married, hooked on painkillers... it's better than it sounds. And finally, Being Human has restarted, and is as much a mediocre mix as ever. Annie is very definitely the most annoying character on TV; she's so weak and male-centric that I'd prefer they didn't bother with female characters if this is how they write them.
Music: No live music this month, but I've been listening to Paolo Nuntini's new album Sunny Side UP, which in theory I should hate, but actually love.
Theatre After only going to the theatre twice last year, I've been twice already this year \o/ First up,The 39 Steps, an excellent comedy adaptation, featuring a cast of four, slapstick, shadow theatre, more Hitchcock references than you can shake a stick at, and much fourth-wall breaking. TBH, the slapstick got a bit much towards the end, but otherwise this was a huge amount of fun. It's on tour round the UK; highly recommended if you can make it. The second one was Really Old, Like Forty-Five, at the National in London last weekend. Billed as a comedy look at our attitudes to old age and ageing, it was a real curate's egg. Couldn't make it's mind up whether to be a drama with some humour, or a comedy laced with seriousness, it managed to fail on both counts, alternating a dark, heart-rending tragedy with farcical slapstick. Patchy acting too. It;s still in preview, so might improve by the time it starts in earnest.
Travel: We took advantage of a good hotel deal, and spent the weekend in London. Biting cold but bright and sunny, we had a great time :-)
Miscellanea: Speaking of which, we finally got around to visiting the Tate Britain, which was really rather good. I had not expected to see so much modern art (OK, so some of it was rubbish - a length of rope thrown on the floor isn't art, really, no matter how many sand-stuff blue canvas cones you place in the vicinity - but there was much that was excellent, including the Pop Art room, and collections by Gilbert & George, Andy Warhol, and Bridget Riley. Some of the older stuff was pretty good too :-p Then off to Tate Modern, which I wish I was as enthused by. Sadly, Surrealism is never going to light my fire (no, a couple of black wavy lines and a patch of white emulsion on blue poster paper is not a deeply symbolic representation of nature, really), but the whole collection seemed lacklustre. The one highlight - and worth the fiver for the boat down the river by itself - was How It Is by Miroslaw Balka. This is a huge 13x30 metre box, with matt black walls, floor and ceiling. As you walk into it, the blackness envelops you, it's difficult to describe the *completeness* of the blackness. The room is full of people, so you slow to shuffling, unable to tell the difference between people moving a few feet in front of you, and the echoes of imprints on your eyes, appearing and fading like ghosts. At one point a man walked just a foot or so in front of me and I have no idea if the little girl walking next to him actually existed. If you get a chance, go visit this. And finally, we went to see the Cabinet War Rooms, which is the underground offices just off Whitehall from where Churchill ran the war. It's a fascinating look at Civil Service and Military office life in the middle of the last century. It isn't cheap, but is well worth a visit (we spent about three hours there, and could have spent longer).