The Great Organic Swindle

Making my way over to my hotel’s breakfast bar I was immediately struck by the many odd-shaped fruits that greeted me. Their roughness and complete lack of uniformity seemed at total odds with the plush surroundings of the hotel. I couldn’t help but be amused by how things had changed. Only a few years previously, such hotels would have been disgusted at the thought of displaying such unaesthetically pleasing fruit. Now, food of this description is proudly eaten by the elite. Inverted snobbery has never been better represented than through shabby chic and its total insincerity has never better been exemplified than through the organic food industry. The term “organic” has now seeped deeply into our society becoming a by-word for more ethical and healthier food production and consumption. However, the only awareness being shown by the corporations and retailers who use this label is an understanding of people can be hoodwinked into paying more for snake oil.

Worst.Vampire. Hunters. Ever.

 “The Strain”, it would appear, was a puzzling labour of love for director/writer Guillermo del Toro. In 2006 he put the idea for a vampire TV series to producers, but it wasn’t picked up. Not to be deterred, del Toro recruited Chuck Hogan, an author with a strong orientation towards screenplay writing, to write a trilogy of novels. I confess to not having read the novels or much into the background of The Strain prior to watching the TV series. I am currently watching the second season, neatly based on the second novel. The third season is out next year, which might only take in half the final part. Del Toro believes that two seasons would do the third novel the most justice, but he is also open to divergences for the benefit of a successful adaptation. One cannot help but read that as his hope to keep the franchise going as long as possible.

Continuiry Bond - A Review of "Spectre"

With this, Eon Films’ fourth instalment of their James Bond reboot starring Daniel Craig, there was clearly a strong intention to both pay homage to the previous franchise and to reward those who have stayed with the current one. Clearly the geek-factor that nearly all Hollywood franchises take seriously is at the very heart of “Spectre”, which is currently the most expensive movie in the history of Bond. How this geek-factor is dealt with in the made-by-committee blockbusters of today can determine the quality of the art being produced.

Striking from the Shadows of '50s Pulp Fiction - Review of Robert Bloch's "Psycho"

 Just off a junction on a busy highway there still exists Bates Motel. This struggling business is run by Norman Bates who endures an oppressive relationship from his unhinged mother who seems hell-bent in keeping her son single and away from the outside world. Then, one night, Mary Crane arrives at the Motel. She is on the run with $40,000 she has stolen from of a client of her real estate company. Soon a private detective and her sister will be after her, but none of them expect the horrors that will ensue the night Mary accidentally turns off the highway and meets the Bates…


We have Peggy Robertson to thank for the franchise that this 1959 pulp fiction thriller spawned and keeps on giving to this day. Apparently Robertson had read a good review by Anthony Boucher of Robert Bloch’s seminal thriller, “Psycho”, despite Paramount Pictures already rejecting the story’s premise. Hitchcock, never one to back to down to anyone in movie world except maybe his wife, thought differently and fought a hard battle against virtually everyone to get the film greenlit. My copy of Bloch’s novel is a paperback published not long after the film was made, but looks fairly plain. In fact, the thin little novel was so indistinct amongst my book collection that I had a job to find it earlier this year.

A Fresh Cut - A Review of "Byzantium"

Eleanor Webb (Saoirse Ronan) and her mother, Clara (Gemma Arterton), are vampires. They have been this way for over 200 years. The pair regularly flees from the pursuit of The Brethren, an all-male secret society of vampires who seek to destroy the two females for violating their code. Eleanor, an eternal teenager, writes accounts of her life and throws the pages into the breeze. Arriving in a coastal town, Clara befriends Noel (Daniel Mays) who has inherited a dilapidated hotel called Byzantium. Clara, who was forced into prostitution when she was mortal, sees an opportunity to run a brothel at the hotel. Meanwhile Eleanor befriends a terminally ill waiter, Frank (Caleb Landry Jones), who reads her life story…

“Byzantium” is an extremely rare example of original, creative and beautiful filmmaking. The film firmly establishes Neil Jordan as one of my all-time favourite directors. He never seems to fail to deliver with his work, carefully weaving artistry with entertainment without falling into pretentiousness at one end or selling out at the other. However, before I discuss how much I feel this film has been criminally overlooked I feel we need some perspective. 

“Gums 2” or “Why a Jaws Remake will Probably Suck!”

Jaws (franchise) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Following on from my article regarding reboots, my attention was recently drawn to the threat that a remake of “Jaws” was in the works. Forgive me for being out of the loop on this one, as it’s been in the public forum since at least April this year. Even more horrifying than this prospect is the fact that it appears to be more than a slight ripple in the rumour tank. The auteur director of the original classic, Steven Spielberg, officially announced this proposal to the executives at Universal.  According to INSC Magazine, Spielberg has been “vehemently” campaigning for super-geek Kevin Smith to direct the picture due to Smith’s clear love of the original. This all seems like more of the cynical geek-chum we have come to expect from remade/rebooted/readapted blockbusters I mentioned in my article about reboots. 

When asked about making a sequel to his original film, Spielberg said that "making a sequel to anything is just a cheap carny trick". However, he did consider taking on “Jaw 2”. This was before he would direct sequels to “Raiders of the Lost Ark”, “Jurassic Park” and would even make an original sequel to J.M. Barrie’s “Peter Pan” in the form of “Hook”. Now, Spielberg believes the time is right to remake “Jaws” taking advantage of the CGI effects available to us. The director was known for his frustrations with the temperamental mechanical sharks used in the original, which were all called “Bruce”. The same INSC Magazine also mentions Spielberg’s interest in such ideas as having an internal monologue for the shark being provided by Ben Affleck, showing that the fish had larger motivations than pure instinct. It gets worse! 

Here are few reasons why a “Jaws” remake, going on the wealth of evidence provided by the film’s legacy might be beyond redemption. 

Art and Artist?

I read the below article, "Our Woody Allen Problem" a few days ago in "Psychology Today". It is interesting that others have pondered the cognitive dissonance we seem to face when we don't agree with the morality of the artist, but we are a fan of their work. I think a huge amount of latitude needs to be applied. If I was to go through all the films, novels, plays, songs, installations, sculptures, paintings, poems etc. etc. and make an assessment of the key artists involved against my own morals, ethics or even personal philosophy, there would be no one left.

This has been a problem for me since childhood. Growing up in a culture that it has often been fashionable to persecute, traditional circus, it became all-too-common to discover that some icon or other opposed what my family did for a living. Not only did I have to make a decision to either separate the individual from what they produced, but I was often at war with my tastes when a certain prejudicial or gross insult to my people suddenly appeared in a favourite programme, book or other work. 

Looking at the example presented in the Woody Allen  article - and I appreciate this isn't the entire thrust of the psychological argument -  the problem here is that the morality of the artist's life casts a troublesome shadow over the themes of his work. Indeed, this was the same issue I encountered when a gross distortion was made about my people. It ended up leading me to question the validity of a certain individual's work. Even in the realm of fantasy and fiction were they a farce?