Now You See Me

I went to see this film to kill a few hours one evening. I’ve just signed up for unlimited films with Cineworld and so I aim to go at least once a week from now on.

This film was a slight disappointment. The premise was really good but the tricks were just too fanciful. I’ve seen some big stage magic before but linking that in with real criminal activity just pushes it beyond the acceptable. This was one of those films where everything seems to have been planned including how everyone will react. I don’t think this is possible and I don’t like it in films. The super-criminal is able to predict exactly how everyone will make their next move and so can perform wondrous tricks and activities. BS. Life just doesn’t work like that. Ultimately people are a little unpredictable and so I don’t like these sorts of films.

Look, it killed a couple of hours and I spent most of the time trying to recognise the Hulk in the film. I’m rubbish at recognising films and so have to rely on IMDB (or the Cardiff Movie Database as I first new it!).

World’s End

Went to see this “British” film in Croydon with A Smith. Sometimes I go to the cinema with A Gunn, so you make your choice about names.

Had a nice curry before the film and some good Indian lager. I don’t think this affected my judgement as Smith thought the same as me.

The film had some nice touches and its funny parts were quite funny but it wasn’t great. “Alright” was just about as far as I could stretch. The lead character was annoying and I just didn’t care much about him. He could have been much more interesting and sympathetic and the film would have been better.

I think they tried to do too much with the film. They’ve done cop films and zombie films and this attempt at sci-fi/horror didn’t really work. The “aliens” could have been much creepier and the gang should have discovered these things a little slower in the film.

It was alright.

The town where it was filmed looked very pretty. Damn, that’s quite a middle-aged thing to say!

Red2

Saw Red2 this morning at Cineworld in Rochester. It killed a few hours after my run. It also was very nearly not Red2 that I watched. I sat through adverts and trailers only for the wrong film to start. We all left the screen and the management said they’d put on the correct film.

Did have to sit through more adverts and trailers though which was a bit shit.

The film itself is funny in a few places and full of crazy action, but overall enjoyable. It’s nice to see old stars doing the action thing. I particularly loved Helen Mirren shooting cops and general up-to-no-goods from a Lotus while it was spinning along the road. Also, the pick-up of Bruce Willis into an Aston (?) driven by Zeta-Jones was excellent and laughable. Great fun. The plot was pretty poor and very “early Bond” but then they made loads of money.

Overall, worth a watch. Not as good as the first.

Pacific Rim

The trailer for this made me worried. It looked pretty poor but it was a hot day and a few hours in an air-conditioned cinema seemed to make sense.
Overall I really enjoyed this film. Yes, it was full of cliché and at times a poor script but overall it’s an excellent example of a crappy kinda action film. It’s a bit like the Iron Man movies but just with larger robots (or whatever you want to call them). It’s also amusing to think that atomic bombs are, once again, the saviour of man-kind. Don’t we have any other ideas for stopping portals from other worlds? We should have some seriously nerdy ideas and make it a “clever” solution to the portal rather than one of brute force, but I guess the general population couldn’t cope with that.
This was a good film in its genre. Worth watching. And, remember to stay through the credits as there’s a lovely little coda that made me laugh out loud in an empty cinema.

Antithesis – The Ivy

Went to see a few bands at The Ivy in Sheerness last night. I was most interested in the band called:

The Antithesis

I’ve seen this band a number of times and really enjoy their music. I thought they were good. Also saw Where’s Billy? who were ok. It was an enjoyable evening. Thanks Dave.

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Bridge

Took this picture while waiting to go into the cinema. I like bridges. When you think about the things we can do as the human race when we put our minds to it, it’s remarkable. We can travel with ease and talk to practically anyone in the world via a small device we can carry. On the negative side we don’t yet have the political ambition to stave off anthropogenic climate change, or even to make sure the end result is the least worst possible outcome because we really are changing our planet and beyond recognition.

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Butt It’s Hot

It was a hot day today. The car said 32C at one point! I decided to spend some time in the direct sunlight in the garden fitting a water butt. That was a bit stupid. Had to spend the next hour drying out the sweat from all my clothes. Mind you, the water butt looks good and we should have its first rain tomorrow.

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Not Quite True

This shop makes a false assumption. I can confirm to you that I’m not that fussed about cake and neither are my kids! Not everyone loves cake!

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I’m probably being a bit picky here!

Lovely View

Such a wonderfully classic view that makes me feel proud to be British! [that takes quite a bit]

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Brilliant Victorians and their wonder at everything new!

Senser – Camden Underworld

Along with Andy, my sister and niece, I went to the Underworld in Camden to see some bands. This was an important gig as I was taking my niece to see some proper music for the first time [she confessed that she has seen Olly Murs but didn’t say it loud enough to cause threats of physical damage to us].
The line-up was:

  • Ingested
  • Senser
  • DJ Starscream

We got the train into St Pancras and then walked the twenty minutes to Camden High Street. After some food and a drink in the World’s End pub we entered the venue and I showed my guests around the delights of the basement. Ingested were on first. They had shouty vocals. They weren’t the worst example of this type of music I had seen but they weren’t that good either.
The main reason I had wanted to come along this evening was that Senser were playing. I have liked their stuff since I was, ok, let’s just say since about 1994 and I saw them once before in Southsea! I like the music and the sound that they have. I thought they were really good. They played two new songs, I think, and the rest I knew. Very good, very energetic. I’m glad my niece saw these as her first proper band. All good stuff.
DJ Starscream was on next. He is the DJ from Slipknot. We tried it. But it’s not our stuff. We left and went for coffee. That’s not down to his ability to play, I’m sure he’s very skilful at what he does, but it left me cold.