LWIF: Jane Austen’s Fight Club

I’m a major fan of Fight Club, as  I’m sure a lot of people are. So when I came across this video I very much enjoyed it. Imagine it, Fight Club, but with Victorian women fighting. This mashup of Victorian prose and modern film is quite well made, and something that I found quite entertaining. I hope you find it just as much fun!

Without further delay, here’s the video:

Twilight Saga: Eclipse – I regret even writing this review let alone watching this movie…

So during the week my girlfriend and I went to see Twilight. Wow, that makes it sound like I went willingly… So let me rephrase it, my girlfriend went to see Twilight and dragged me along. I’d like to say that I’m violently against twilight, but in fact I really just don’t care.

The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, is the third instalment in the latest fad to hit tweens and mothers who think they’re hip to the groove and such like. What can I say? It’s a pretty well known franchise.

So let’s get down to the nitty-gritty. I decided to watch the two previous movies just to get an impression of what I was dealing with. I couldn’t stick either of them for longer than 40 minutes each without having a break to stop my brain from melting from the poor acting and distinct lack of plot. On several occasions I kept saying myself,

“What’s romantic about Edward and Bella’s relationship? He follows her around everywhere and controls almost every part of her life! Edward is an asshole!”

In state of pure dread, I went into the cinema knowing full well that I was going to see every minute pass by like an hour…

Now before I tear this film to shreds, I shall first state that I really did enjoy the sound-track. However, aside from that I’m afraid my enjoyment was minimal…

The best way to take care of this review is to take the main characters and deal with them individually:

1)      Bella:

There is a wonderful line that she uses that describes her character in full,

“I am Switzerland!” For those of you who are unaware, she is referring to a country famous for its complete neutrality. Bella is neutral in every sense of the word, she doesn’t display any emotion at all, her character doesn’t develop it remains in this constant state of beige. In every scene she looks bored, as if even the actress herself can’t stand how boring her assigned character is! Bella is shit! Just look at the poster (link) she looks so bored!

2)      Edward:

I’m going to move on from the “Vampires don’t sparkle” nonsense. Edward constantly sounds like she’s about to cry, and I have to admit, for an immortal and semi-invincible being with super-powers you’d expect him to have a bit more backbone. Even when he’s threatening Jacob he still has that wimpy crying voice. MAN UP EDWARD!

While I’m at it, he creeps me out to no end. He’s constantly following Bella around, never leaving her alone for a second. Sure, they’re a perfect match because neither character seems to have a personality. He follows her around the place, at one point wrecks her car so she won’t go and see Jacob! This guy is a creep! Yet I still can’t convince any of these twilight fans that Edward isn’t the ideal boyfriend, he’s an ideal stalker!

3)      Jacob:

While I don’t buy into this Team [insert name] crap, I must admit that I’m pretty much pro-Jacob. For one thing, he is the only character in the entire movie series that shows any signs of being remotely interesting. He’s also a werewolf, well not really a werewolf; an animagus (a term from Harry Potter meaning someone who can shape-shift into a particular animal) is a more appropriate term. The fact is, he is the only character that displays any form of emotion and doesn’t sound like he’s about to cry or just plain wander off in a state of sheer boredom.

Bits that annoyed me:

There were a load of them, too many to mention but here are a few:

Edward, by my calculations, is about 100 years old and he started going out with Bella when she was 16 if I have my facts straight. So that means that both Bella and Edward are perverts, Edward for going after jailbait and Bella for being a necrophile!

There is no romance in the movie at all, just a very inappropriate amount of kissing. Seriously, what’s romantic about having a boyfriend who follows you everywhere and watches everything that you’re doing?

There’s no proper reason as to why Bella is being hunted. Sure you have that girl Victoria, but the explanation isn’t given until near the end of the movie. So for the majority of it, you’re wondering why everything is happening, and not because you’re interest, you’re asking because Edward keeps saying over and over that Bella is better off not knowing because he’s “protecting” her. BULLSHIT! That’s called being controlling! It’s also called an inconsistent plot rendering everything that happens up until the point where Edward actually explains to Victoria why Victoria is doing what she’s doing pointless. Good god! Stephanie, if you ever read this blog, please for the love of all that is awesome, think of the basic plot outline BEFORE you start writing the book instead of doing it on the fly!

The overall plot suggests that love conquers all, but in reality it suggests something sinister. If you’re a vampire, and follow a girl around the place for long enough, watching her every move and generally making sure that she doesn’t hang around with anyone but you then you will have a great loving relationship. That’s just wrong…

This movie sucks, it really does, and it’s not even visually appealing. Don’t go to see it, you will be bored!

Anyway, hope you enjoyed reading this at least,

Felix

Leave a comment and let us know what you think of this movie. What did you like? What did you hate? Did you manage to stay in the cinema till the end?

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How one poster ruined an entire movie for me…

Look at this picture… You look at this picture and what do you see? You see what is obviously the protagonist holding the head of Medusa. This is what was displayed in the local cinema when this film came out… THIS! Is what ruined an entire film for me! Now you sit there reading this blog laughing to yourself saying,

“Felix, you’re being silly. That poster doesn’t ruin anything!”

YES IT DOES! I’ll explain why!

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Before you continue reading, please click on the picture above!

So in the beginning we meet Perseus who is adopted by a fisherman after being found in a coffin floating about the sea. Everyone’s grown up and he and his family witness the destruction of a statue of Zeus and wind up being attacked by Hades. It’s all sad, and to be honest, I was enjoying the film, the character developement so far has been excellent! The plot has kepted a steady pace and the effects have been minimal, I had nothing to complain about. That is, until the announcement that a Kraken would be unleashed unless Andromeda was sacrificed. At this point, a little spark flickered in the back of my mind. I couldn’t let the spark fizzle away, this was obviously a memory, so after about 2 minutes I suddenly found a complete recall of the poster that I saw outside the screen.

PERSEUS HOLDING THE HEAD OF MEDUSA!

You see the picture? Look at it, that was the ad! So after a visit from Io, the women who never ages, he suddenly gets the motivation to save humanity and go and work out a way to kill the Kraken. So from the poster, I can assume that our pal Perseus uses the head of Medusa to get the Kraken. So even before the witches tell him to go and get Medusa’s head, I know he’s going to be going to get it. So the scenes involving the scorpions and those ent-like creatures was utterly pointless because they go away after everyone speaks to the witches. The other lads who went on to Medusa are pointless because they all die, even Io dies. We already know from the Poster that he gets the head of Medusa so the trip to Medusa really shouldn’t be that significant, and the battle with the Kracken should be the leadup to the battle with Hades.

After 40 minutes or so of cursing a poster, I then needed something to bring me back from the brink. I needed something to save this movie for me, but no Perseus deals with Hades in under a minute. I mean seriously, the Kracken is destroyed after 40 minutes of pointless filler and all Hades gets is a quick quip from Perseus and then BAM! Hades is flung back to the underworld, and I am left completely underwhelmed.

So what’s the moral of the story? Well, film producers should give better consideration to what they advertise keeping in mind that what they display may in fact ruin the entire film, much like what happened here.

So I’m going to end this now, because just thinking about this infuriates me!

Felix

Leave a comment and let us know if you came across this problem. Follow me on twitter and be sure to take a look around the website.

LWIF: All of Robin’s Holy [insert word]s!

I’m afraid this edition of Look What I Found comes in the form of a link rather than something embedded. However, to all of you people out there who are major fans of the Adam West Batman TV series, you’ll love this.

It’s a playlist of all of Robin’s Holy [insert word] phrases. It’s quite fascinating to see a list as long as this one, so without wanting to prolong the inevitable any further, here’s the link:

Listen to all of Robin’s Sayings

Just as an added bonus, here’s a video of the Bat-dance:

Letters: Dear Caller (again)

I’d like to take this wonderful opportunity to say something to you, as I obviously couldn’t get through to you the first time. Don’t take this the wrong way, I’m not trying to offend you, I’m just telling you the truth and lets face it, I’ve yet to see someone who hasn’t been hurt in some way by the truth.

YOU ARE AN IDIOT!

I love it when what you have to say can be said simply and concisely. Yeah, you’re an idiot and a disgrace to the human race! I’m going to outline in very clear terms why, in fact that is yet another thing that can be summarised quite easily

YOU DON’T THINK!

Okay, so it’s the middle of the night and you have a problem, what do you do? CALL SOMEONE! Of course, that’s the correct answer and no one is questioning it. However that should be the last question out of 5 questions:

1)      What exactly is the problem?

2)      Does it need to be fixed right now? (Important!)

3)      Can I fix it myself?

4)      What time is it?

5)      Do I need to call someone right now? (Important!)

Questions 2 and 5 are the most important questions to ask yourself. The usual rule of thumb is, do not make the phone call unless someone will die if it’s not reported or the damaged caused by waiting will be significant i.e. the company will be unable to operate as a result. These are obvious questions that you need to ask yourself when ringing ANY call through. However, I’m finding myself having to write another rant about you so I’m going to have to explain each question individually:

1)      What exactly is the problem?

This seems obvious, but you’d be surprised how many people don’t actually know what the problem is when they call an after-hours support line. You need to be able to explain what the problem is in order for us to gauge the severity of the issue. So the solution to this is to either explain why you need to speak to an engineer/technician by saying what the problem is e.g. I can’t connect to the Internet.

2)      Does it need to be fixed right now?

Now that we’ve figured out what the problem is, we need to make a decision. Does it need to be fixed now or can it wait? I know I’m repeating myself but the usual rule of thumb is, do not make the phone call unless someone will die if it’s not reported or the damage caused by waiting will be significant i.e. the company will be unable to operate as a result. So if no one is going to die, and the company can still function, then you probably don’t need to make a phone call.

3)      Can I fix it myself?

Surprisingly enough, this question is often ignored. The majority of times, the problem that you present to an engineer/technician after hours can easily be solved without the use of their skills. The famous line from the IT crowd comes into play more often than not,

“Have you tried turning it off and on again?”

4)      What time is it?

Depending on what time it is during the day, this question changes significance, and as such I will split everything into blocks:

Monday to Friday (9am to 5pm)

During this time, I highly recommend just ringing any calls you have through. Try to avoid ringing between 4pm and 5pm. This hour is when everyone seems to think it’d be perfect to finally ring the photocopier company to mention that the photocopier has been on fire for the last 4 days etc. If you want anything done, ring between 10am and 12pm. This two-hour period is when people are more than willing to help because they’re awake alert and all the facilities will be available to them.

Saturday and Sunday (9am to 5pm)

Don’t ring between 10am and 12pm unless it’s an actual emergency. Everyone rings support lines at this time and there just aren’t enough people to deal with it. Instead try and ring early in the morning or else around 2pm.

Monday to Sunday (5pm to 10pm)

This time period is an interesting one. You can guarantee that engineers/technicians will be awake, however none of them will be very willing to make a call out. So more often than not, they will ring you back and try and solve the problem over the phone rather than get in their car and go to you. Why? They’re watching cartoons, or the match or something.

Monday to Sunday (10pm to 9am)

During this time period you really need to have a think about the call you’re about to make. You should remember that you are ringing someone during anti-social hours and so a professional attitude is one that will not exist at this time. Take it as a given, you are inconveniencing people by ringing them during this time-slot. As such, a good way to start a conversation is to apologise for ringing at whatever time you’re ringing at or at least acknowledging the time!

5)      Do I need to call someone right now?

This will seem like a simple question, but it’s a bit more complex. You need to figure out if you actually need voice-to-voice or face-to-face support for the problem. The Internet will more often than not have the information you need and even have a dedicated forum for it. Why not check online to see if your problem can be solved?

Again, can this call wait until the morning? Is it an emergency or an inconvenience? If it’s the latter than put down the phone and walk away. Take care of it in the morning when you and the technician will be awake.

Seriously, if you take the time to consider what I’ve just said then life will be easier for you. You won’t come across as an idiot because you’ll have thought everything through!

So please, stop calling me at 2am because your Internet doesn’t work. Go back to bed; you aren’t doing anything important at that time of night.

Felix

So have you guys had similar experiences to me? Leave a comment and tell us about them.

Be sure to follow me on twitter as well while you’re at it!

DVD Review: Exam

Right so this film is about a year old and to be honest, if it wasn’t for the fact that someone gave me a copy of it, I would probably have never seen it. The actual release is up for debate because it’s been premiered in various locations. However the DVD was only released in the last month or so. This film is quite obscure anyway, in fact, I probably wouldn’t have come across it if it wasn’t for the fact that a certain online shop decided to send me the wrong DVD. Rather than send an angry email upon discovering the mistake, I decided that I’d watch it and based on my opinion of it, I’d submit a complaint. The name of the film in question is Exam.

The plot of this movie is quite simple, and therefore doesn’t actually do the film any justice. 8 talented candidates are involved in the final stage of the interview process for a very lucrative job in a powerful and mysterious company. The final test is quite simple; there is one question and one answer, however all of their papers appear blank. So the main objective becomes trying to figure out what the question is.

Now with such a simple test, there has to be rules. The rules are also simple:

1)      Don’t spoil your exam paper

2)      Don’t talk to the invigilator or the guard

3)      Don’t leave the room

The main thing to take from what I’ve said so far is that when the test and the rules are both simple, people will make everything complicated. Guess what happens? THEY MAKE EVERYTHING COMPLICATED!

This movie is very good in that you wind up getting involved in the test yourself. Trying to figure out what the question is, figure out where the question might be or even if there is a question. You try and figure out who the winner will be and everything!

This movie will make the smartest person in the world feel like an idiot by the end of it. In fact I’ve shown this movie to friends of mine and none of them could figure out the question until the very end. However, this is also the movies major downfall. Once you’ve watched it, it’s got no replay value that I can see. Why? Well you know the question and the answer. They explain everything by the end credits so the only question that remains is, what happens next? To be honest, I don’t see the point in a sequel at all, and rightly so.

So do I recommend this movie? I have to admit, this is a great movie, but you have to be in the right mood to watch it. If you want a brainless movie, then please leave this one alone; you won’t enjoy it. If however you want to melt your brain trying to figure out what’s happening the entire time, then find a copy of this and watch it!

So have you seen this movie? Leave a comment letting us know what you thought. Remember to follow me on twitter and if you have any suggestions be sure to send an email to felixbarry@rocketmail.com

Enjoy

Felix

CD Review: Divine Comedy – Bang Goes The Knighthood

I find an awful lot that people are listening to two kinds of music:

1)      Music with threatening lyrics

2)      Music with nonsensical lyrics

I’m serious, next time you listen to the radio listen to just the lyrics and you’ll find that the person singing is either talking a load of crap or else threatening someone. It really has become a situation where the majority of songs are popular due to shock value rather than just being entertaining and pleasant to listen to.

In the late 60’s when rock was in its prime we found powerful music, music techniques that would makes your head explode, it was literally about the music. Nowadays however, music seems to simply be about sounding like everyone else, but either saying something aggressive or stupid, sometimes both! So when I came across “Bang Goes the Knighthood” by The Divine Comedy, I really didn’t have much expectations for it.

I’m going to be honest here; I was never a major fan of The Divine Comedy. I’ll admit that it was my own fault because Neil Hannon et al are very capable musicians and top-rank entertainers. I will admit that the first time I came across them was their single, “Generation Sex” from the 1998 album, Fin de Siècle. Keep in mind, I was 12 years old that year, and to be honest being the mild-mannered little darling that I was, I listened to it purely because it had the word sex in it and didn’t really appreciate the song. As time went by, the next song of theirs that crossed my path was “National Express” from the same album. Now this one I wasn’t too fond of for a number of reasons… It, like so many good songs, received too much airplay. MTV kept playing it repeatedly, radios would blast it every hour or so, you couldn’t get away from it. So again, I wasn’t attracted to the band purely because I was unable to appreciate what they had to offer.

2010 rolls along and I find myself in the possession of their 10^th studio album. A friend of mine presented me with it, one of those friends whose taste in music is as questionable as their personal hygiene. However, I hadn’t sat down and listened to anything new in a long time so I gave it a chance. I put the CD player, plugged in my headphones, turned on the Hi-fi amp and sat back. The first time around I will admit I was apprehensive, I had never actually given this band a chance remember, and had somewhat of a tarnished opinion of them. The final track, “I Like”, finished and I was unsure; so I played the entire thing again! This time around I started to become a major fan!

There are too many good songs on this album, and picking favourites would pretty much be reciting the entire track list, but I’ll give it a go. Track 2, “The Complete Banker”, is a lovely little jazzy number about the credit crunch; I was listening to this song while looking over some bills and I have to admit the song made me happy! Track 3, “Neapolitan Girl” is a wonderful walking song, again, I found myself smiling the entire time it played. Track 4, “Bang Goes the Knighthood”, is a wonderfully dramatic song, I stopped dead in my tracks halfway through this as the choir and organ started playing. Track 5, “At the Indie Disco”, was a wonderfully nostalgic song that made me remember my final year of secondary school when I spent a lot of my time in a place called Doyle’s in Dublin. Track 7, “Assume the Perpendicular” is the best walking song I’ve heard from the last 5 years. I don’t know how they do it, but listening to this song puts a sense of determination in my step that nothing else could. Finally, Track 11, “Can You Stand upon One Leg”, is a great song that I just had to learn the moment I finished listening to it. It’s strange to find a great song for kids within an album that’s most certainly geared towards adults. Nonetheless, I managed to entertain the younger members of my family with this number and I have Mr. Hannon to thank for that.

I really don’t know what more to say, this is a brilliant album and you should definitely get it. Why? You won’t find a more entertaining album out there at the moment, and it’ll put you in such a good mood that you’ll be smiling for days playing the entire thing on repeat!

GET THIS ALBUM NOW!

Felix

PS.

Let us know what you thought of the album by leaving a comment below.

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My demands as one who listens to music!

When I turn on the radio I’m often completely embarrassed on behalf of society for allowing so many people make money off of songs that can only be described as tacky crappy pap! My demands as a listener aren’t that hard to meet, or at least I thought so until I went and looked at Irelands top 40 records…  Here are my demands:

1) Lyrics should make sense.

I don’t think it’s too much to ask that lyrics follow a sense of logic and maintain some decent level of grammar. While I appreciate that colloquialisms are cool and all that, I truly believe that if you want to get your point across and be taken in some way seriously, then you need to show that you have a certain level of command over the English language (or whatever language you’re singing in). To me, not using proper English basically makes you look like an idiot. So when I see someone saying, “I’mma” instead of “I’m going to” I really can’t take them seriously. Even considering poetic license, it should never get to a point where you’re literally abbreviating 4 words together just to have them fit in a 2 syllable space. What’s next? Entire sentences shortened to a single burst of consonants? I can see it now, the latest hit “chgnjmlptn”, which is short for, “I’m not that fond of you especially after you cheated on me and so I’m dumping you and going to a pub to have a few drinks and celebrate my freedom!”

It’s also reasonable to ask that the lyrics follow a sense of logic. Whatever the song is about should be discussed within to a certain level of detail. Simply having a song where the total number of lyrics comprises of “I’mma fuck you up bitch!” then you can’t claim the song is about a particular event, all you can claim is that the song is about threatening some girl with violence.

2) The music should provide something original.

The problem that we are facing is one of the most basic things that humans suffer from, which is a fear of what is different. We as people don’t like the idea of new music; we like to be bombarded with the same stuff repeatedly. We as listeners are creatures of habit and enjoy music that involves a certain formula. The more familiar the better! If you want examples, then have a look at these two videos proving just how easily we latch on to the familiar rather than the different:

I know I’m not alone on this point, and as such I don’t like to listen to the same style of music over and over. I try to avoid the formula as much as I can by jumping from decade to decade, style to style etc. Why should musicians be forced to adhere to a formula in order to make any decent money? Surely the whole point of calling them “Artists” is that they are providing something new to the musical melting pot.

3) The subject of songs should be different.

I’m almost certain that I’m not the only person who has noticed a trend with certain styles of music and the fact that the subject matter of the songs seem to remain the same. The most famous style of music for having stagnant subject matters is Emo. In this genre you are guaranteed a musical moan about how life isn’t fair over and over.  This level of banality is spread across EVERY genre. If someone sings about something other than the “normal” subjects, then they are labelled as “Whacky!” which I think is a load of crap! Frank Zappa was hailed as being eccentric, but the guy simply wrote songs about stuff no one else was and wasn’t afraid to be himself! Why should he be stigmatised purely because he did something different? I think we need a lot more artists like him!

Well there you go, I don’t think I’m asking for too much by mentioning these things, do you? What are your opinions on this matter? What are your demands as a listener?

Felix

PS. Be sure to follow me on twitter (@Felix_Barry)