Steeped as I am in Anglo-Saxon reserve, I sometimes find myself at serious odds with the times allotted me for my four score and ten. Not for me the incessant sharing of amateur self-portraiture, the eavesdropping on private moments and the social ‘connectedness’ of Facebook, Twitter and the
In 1346 the Mongolian army brought the Black Plague to Europe. Laying siege to the Crimean port of Caffa, Jani Beg the leader of ‘the Golden Horde’ decided to catapult the infected corpses of his comrades over the city walls. Those citizens who escaped took the bacterium Yersinia Pestis back
It’s been a year since an act of a madman shocked the country. Fifty-one souls lost to a psychopath on an autumn afternoon in Christchurch. Our worst act of peacetime violence shouldn’t be an easy thing to forget. And yet, only a year on, those of a
It may be a bit of a dirge. It may sorely lack (in my humble musical opinion) a Keith Richardsesque guitar riff and a Keith Moon drum break. It may contain archaic language (‘thee’, ‘thy’, ‘entreat’) and be acknowledged as the work of a second rate poet set to a
You can understand the temptation. There they are, natural show-offs, suddenly with a live audience of millions and a rare chance to benefit us poor non-showbiz types with their superior wisdom. That special wisdom not gained by serious study or lived experience but by, ahem…playing dress-ups.
If you are looking for evidence of new media eclipsing the old look no further than The Joe Rogan Experience podcast. Two weeks ago when Bill Maher wanted to promote a new series of his TV show Real Time he didn’t sit down with the New York Times or
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black Last month Martin Scorsese drew the ire of millennials with a condemnation of Marvel movies, as mere ‘theme parks’ and ‘not cinema’. If anyone has earnt the right to opine on the art of film its Scorsese. He has made a
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black Here’s a pub question worth a beery rumination: Who did the most for the cause of human freedom in the twentieth century? Sir Winston Churchill? Martin Luther King? Ronald Reagan? An eccentric choice but not one without a sound argument
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black Dr Sleep, the long awaited, much belated sequel to the classic horror The Shining is a bonfire of lost opportunities. The original Stephen King novel of an alcoholic writer, Jack Torrance and his wife and psychic child stranded in the Overlook
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black So let’s get the plot of the Terminator saga straight: Big bad Arnold Swarze-wish-I-could-spell-his-name was sent from a future of sentient machines to our past to kill the mother of a future leader of
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black Jojo Rabbit, the new film by Taika Waititi, isn’t as brave or as clever as many critics, and no doubt the filmmaker himself, seem to think. Remember this is the same gentleman who proclaimed his homeland ‘Racist as F*#K’
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular column by John Black He’s survived the evil machinations of Blofeld, Goldfinger and Dr No but can he survive his most powerful adversary yet, the Social Justice Warrior? The trailer for the next James Bond movie ‘No Time to Die’ is imminent and the
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black A little thought experiment if you will. Imagine a movie based on the following premise: A group of single dads, working as bartenders at a high class New York bar frequented by wealthy women, decide that their generous tips aren’t
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black There should be an entire circle of Hell dedicated to people who opine on movies without seeing them first. More than any blockbuster movie in recent memory, Joker has been the victim of such predestinarian soothsaying. Based on nothing but the
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black With the recent release of Rambo: Last Blood and its critical mauling for daring to feature a violent and vengeful 73 year old man (the Guardian called it an ‘enlarged prostate of a movie’; imagine if someone had called Thelma and
Burn, Hollywood, Burn A regular review by John Black How does a man well past his party years wind up in a cinema early on a Friday evening drinking whiskey neat and watching the latest Rambo movie? A bad week, that’s how. A vicious stew of happenstance – a wallet
