The Cairngorms in Winter

I was at Eden Court earlier this week to see the film The Cairngorms in Winter, featuring outdoors writer Chris Townsend and directed by Terry Abraham. The film is an intriguing mix of geographical documentary, “how to” guide to winter walking and camping, introduction to the Cairngorms (Townsend’s home area), beautiful advert for the Scottish Highlands…

World War Z – a film review

When I read Max Brooks’ magnificent book World War Z, I knew there were plans for a film, and I knew they wouldn’t work. As I described in my review of it, World War Z is a fictional account of interviews conducted by a UN official with survivors of a great zombie war that decimated…

The Iron Lady

Such was the long shadow cast over the 1980s in the UK by the government of the time, that when I was growing up as a boy I thought the purpose of General Elections was to decide who would form the Conservative Party. Their impact on the country was embodied and dominated by the Prime…

Life in a Day – a review

I went to the cinema at Eden Court last night with some friends to see Life in a Day, an unusual and surprisingly effective film experiment.  The premise, created by YouTube, Ridley Scott and others, involved asking people all over the world to submit videos of their lives taken on one particular day – 24…

Mogwai: Burning

I went to see “Mogwai: Burning” at Eden Court the other week. It’s a film by Glasgow band Mogwai, arguably among the grandaddies of post-rock, and is effectively a wordless documentary about a series of gigs they performed in New York last year. Shot in a black and white, with blurry, fast-paced camerawork, the film…

Four Lions: a review

A few months ago, Four Lions hit the cinema screens, and it’s taken me until now – and a late run at Eden Court – to catch it. I’m sorry it took such a long time, because I have really wanted to see it firstly because it is by Chris Morris and secondly because by…

Boredom at Tiffany’s

One of the most recent aspects to feature in my life is LoveFilm, the mail-order film service that, for a monthly fee, lets you receive as many films as you can manage to watch and post back. Nicole and I have enjoyed educating each other about our film tastes over the months, with an eclectic…

Three films

It’s been film season here the last few days, and Nicole and I last night had our third cinema trip in as many days. It’s nice to have not just a big multiplex on the edge of town but also the excellent Eden Court, which we’ve been visiting a lot since being made “friends” as…

District 9

I went to the cinema last night to see District 9. It’s been out for some time, but it was still a surprise to be a whole one-third of the entire audience. It was an astonishing, refreshing and gripping South African science fiction film, set in the near future when an alien ship arrives on…

Moon

I went to Eden Court last night to see Moon, a film I’d heard a little about it and was keen to see. The story is set in the near future, and revolves around an astronaut, Sam Bell, who is working alone for three years on a mining station on the moon, with only his…

The Golden Compass

I went to see the aforesaidmentioned film last night. It was good. But only good, not excellent. Sadly, the film didn’t pack the punch of the books, have the engrossing, loveable characters, or the careful explanation of the strange world in which the story takes place. Much was missed out from the books, corners were…