TV Books and films of the week

I haven't updated this article for a couple of weeks. Since I last wrote to of my favourite programmes have returned to the screen. Both feature intelligent, good looking women with attitude. The first is Only Connect. The program is an intellectual quiz and shows on BBC Four. This channel is worth the licence fee alone. It is presented by the delightful Victoria Coren. The format is fairly simple. There are four rounds:- The connections round, what is the last in the sequence, the wall and the missing vowels round. This is no average quiz. The winners are usually capable of beating mastermind champions, University Challenge winning teams. It requires the ability to think laterally and I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Those who know me will be able to tell you that in relation to the kitchen I do have other gods before me. I enjoy cooking when I am in the mood and tend towards using the force. I don't measure stuff. I was taught this by my parents who were taught it by their parents.  I am definitely a cook not a chef. Whilst I enjoy Masterchef I think it is all a bit poncy. I like to have a plate of food and to be full after eating. I do not like plate decoration. My other gods or in fact goddesses are called Delia and Nigella. However, my allegiance is to Nigella. A friend once described her programs as 'food porn' and she has even been impersonated along those lines by a number of heretic comedians. What is it I like about Nigella? She is intelligent. She is gorgeous, curvy and the way she licks her lips or licks her fingers after eating is frankly indecent. The bottom line though is the food and it is gorgeous. I have all her books and they are well thumbed tomes. I am looking forward to when I get my hands on her...new book.

In terms of books I am in the middle of reading Bernard Cornwell's Alfred series following the exploits of Uhtred of Bebbanburg. Cornwell is easy to read. I don't like having to work to get my pleasure when reading and I think literary fiction to be as bad as the Turner Prize. I have never read one of these sort of books and been satisfied. I am currently in book three, The Lords of the North. In and amongst finishing The Last Kingdom and The Pale Horseman I also read the novel on which the film Let The Right One In was based. The cover proclaimed that the novel was worthy of Stephen King. Maybe during the phase when he wrote The Tommyknockers. Whilst I was initially interested in the story I found myself gradually being left with a sense of disappointment. I no longer cared about who lived or died. I was also unsure of who all the characters were. It was all a bit unsatisfactory.

In terms of films I have been watching some have been good, some have been interesting and some have been so bad they were good. Last weekend I watched The Fifth Element and Serenity. I also watched Fantastic Four Rise of the Silver Surfer. The Fantastic Four Rise was an improvement on the original FF film. Well that is not a particularly hard task. It is a diverting film but no more than that. Chris Evans, who plays the Human Torch, has since gone on to play Captain America. The Fifth Element is Luc Besson's Sci Fi film. Besson seems to be a bit like the late Stanley Kubrick. Kubrick made genre films such as The Shining and 2001. Once he had ticked off a genre he went onto something new. Besson is similar. He made Leon which was a work of brilliance. The Fifth Element is his sci-fi film. It features Mila Jovovich, Bruce Willis and Gary Oldman. The plot is a little weird but show me a sci fi film where it isn't. Oldman gives an incredible performance as the slightly deranged arms dealing servant of the dark powers. The supporting cast is brilliant apart from Chris Rock who is even more irritating than normal.  The other film was Serenity. A western in space. This film is an underrated masterpiece. Joss Whedon did a reverse Buffy with this one. When he made the film Buffy the Vampire Slayer it bombed so he made a series. The series went on too long in my opinion. the last series of Buffy featured Nathan Fillion. Whedon cast him in his new series Firefly which was cancelled by the network so Whedon made Serenity. The film has good and evil but they are blurred. The action sequences are stunning and Chiwetel Ejiofor as a government assassin is brilliant. The ideas in the film are intriguing and interesting and this film along with The Fifth Element comes with a high recommendation.

In the last couple of days I have started something of a Clint Eastwood fest. It started with Firefox. Not one of his greatest performances and not a particularly good film. Lots of British actors doing fairly ropey Russian accents. The special effects which in the 1980s were quite good do not stand up well against today's effects. The book on which it is based is by Craig Thomas and is well worth a read.  I have just started into the Dollar Western Trilogy - A Fistful of Dollars, For A Few Dollars More and The Good The Bad and The Ugly. All are worth watching but the best by some distance is The Good The Bad and The Ugly.

Eastwood is at his best in these films and laid the groundwork for his later masterpieces The Outlaw Josey Wales and Unforgiven. The score is memorable and with able support from Lee Van Cleef, Gian Maria Volonte and Eli Wallach these are amongst the best westerns ever made.

Happy media watching I feel some cheesecake coming on.

Films of the week (w/c28/11/09)

Well it's been a while since I reviewed any films or indeed anything. I will be watching Highlander 2:Renegade Cut in the next few days. To all those who remember the abomination that was Highlander 2 at the cinema it is supposed to be the film we should have seen. I am currently watching Series 2 of the Highlander TV series.

I have recently finished reading Stuart Maconie's Cider With Roadies. If you are interested in music history it is interesting. It is not as good as Pies & Prejudice but is much better than Adventures on the High Teas. That just didn't click for me.

So on with the films on Saturday there are 3 films each of which if they didn't have the competition would be film of the day. The Adventures of Robin Hood is Hollywood does English legend ye olde englishe waye. It is a fantastic romp and Basil Rathbone, Erroll Flynn and Claude Rains simply chew up the screen. Overlapping this gem is The Empire Strikes Back. This is by a considerable distance the best of the original three Star Wars films and by definition, therefore, the best of the six. It is dark and the Vadar and Yoda characters are fantastic. Late night on Virgin 1 is No Way Out. Gene Hackman acts Kevin Costner off the screen in what is one of Costner's best films. It is simply well written, well acted and a pacy thriller.

On Sunday yet again there are a clutch of interesting offerings. Channel 5 offers Firefox. Based on the Craig Thomas novel of the same name it is actually quite a good adaptation of the book. Unfortunately it was panned by just about everybody as one of Clint Eastwood's worst films. The dodgy Russian accents offered by pretty much the entire membership of Equity are a delight to behold. It is good fun if not a great movie. It is followed by The Green Mile. This is based on the Stephen King story. It is the director Frank Darabont's second King prison flick after The Shawshank Redemption. Coincidentally the stage play of that film is in trouble with a number of reviewers for putting a review of the film over it's theatrical offering which was not so praiseworthy apparently. I am not a big Tom Hanks fan but this is one of his better films. Other offerings are Sahara (Film 4) which is a very good action adventure offering. Lastly there is Enemy at the Gates. This isn't rated too highly in Radio Times but I think it is actually a very entertaining movie if at variance with actual history.

On Tuesday the undoubted film of the day is Flags of Our Fathers (Film 4) This is one of Clint Eastwood's 2 war films and is actually probably the slightly weaker of the two in my humble opinion. Nevertheless it is still a better film than most you will see. It tells the Iwo Jima tale from the American point of view. The outstanding performance in this film comes from Adam Beach who can also be seen in another fantastic film, Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee. The other film on Tuesday is The Blues Brothers. There isn't a plot as such it is merely a series of set pieces to showcase the fantastic music which is what the film is all about.

Wednesday brings the second of the Clint Eastwood war films, Letters From Iwo Jima. I think this is the best of the two. Ken Watanabe is truly magnificent but is there a film where he isn't, perhaps Batman Begins. Also on Wednesday there is First Blood. This is the first and, by some considerable distance, the best of the Rambo films. Stallone is excellent, despite evidence to the contrary (Stop Or My Mom Will Shoot), he can act given the right material (Rocky, Copland, Judge Dredd). The tension is ratcheted up in this film. Brian Dennehy is a fantastic foil and watch out for David Caruso of CSI Miami. If only the rest of the franchise could have been a patch on this one they would all be classics.

On Thursday there is one underrated offering and one guilty pleasure. The underrated offering is Black Widow. It is not normally one of my type of films and I certainly wouldn't go out of my way to see it. However, I ended up watching it one evening and was impressed with the offering. The guilty pleasure is Rat Race. It is by the Airplane team which means one of two things usually. A film will be either very very funny (Airplane, Naked Gun, Police Squad) or it will be very dodgy (Kentucky Fried Movie, Top Secret). There are gags in this film that you laugh at but your not sure why or even if you should be laughing but you can't help it.

We end the week with two films on Friday night. The first of these, The Jackal, shouldn't work and some still feel that it is heresy that it was ever made, but it is a great film that whilst showing a nod to its illustrious predecessor doesn't feel constrained by it. It takes what worked in the original but changes it slightly. Bruce Willis is absolutely fantastic as the title character, Sidney Poitier is fantastic as the FBI agent. The one thing that spoils this film is Richard Gere and the frankly ludicrous plot involving an ex-Basque terrorist. The second film is Downfall. This is about the last days in Hitler's bunker in Berlin. It is a film which was universally lauded particularly Bruno Ganz who portrays the German dictator. I found it a bit turgid and long winded for my taste. It might well be very good but I found it hard going.

Enjoy yourselves more to come in the next few days.