I love Ponyo

I forgot to post this one.

It was my daughters inset day the other week, so as I had a few spare day's holiday I dutifully took a day off to spend some quality daddy/eldest daughter time together.

I decided to offer a few activities to her. She chose the ice skating as predicted as she had been watching the 2010 Olympics and also liked on the odd occasion, the dancing on ice programme on terrestrial TV.

But secretly I had checked the film times and planned to take her to the cinema to see the underdog film of the half term holiday called Ponyo.

Thankfully I had listened the Mark Kermodes comments on the film and was sure I could convince her this was not another hollow Hollywood animation in the vein of Bolt etc and was more captivating.

We sped from the ice rink in record time to the most expensive multiplex cinema in the area. Gun Wharf Quays Vue Cinema.

Armed with £20's worth of refreshment (crap) we quickly passed the ceiling high posters of Wolfman which created a barrage of questions from my daughter about "that film is about a man who is a wolf isn't it dad" to screen number 10 and an audience of 10 people.

We sat down just in time to see an advert about child abuse. I swear the gods were against me that day.

Firstly I need to make sure my daughter does not get nightmares about people who turn into wolves and next I am readying myself for light explainations about child abuse and how there are some people who abuse litle children, thus causing more nightmares.

Crying out loud I just want to huddle up, consume to some unknown pork substance in a roll and wash it down with a large cup of diet nastiness whilst managing to watch my first Anime on the big screen.

The film is about a boy who finds a goldfish (Ponyo) that turns into a girl and the adventures of the two as they avoid Ponyo's fathers wishes to stay in the sea with the other brothers and sisters of Ponyo. Yes bizzare I know.

I was not let down.

Although I have not seen Hayao Miyazaki's other work which I am led to believe is just as impressive. I thoroughly enjoyed the film. I mean I really was awe struck by the tale, the animation and the draw into the simple plot.

It has been a while since I have seen Anime, but it all flooded back to me. The styling of the animation was very simple and soft. There was no striving to try and accurately recreate real life a'la Pixar.

You very quickly accepted the weird and wonderful world Hayao Miyazaki had created. Its weirdness and slight departure from real world.

I instantly wanted to be the little boy living with his mum on the cliff top house running down the path to sail his boat on the ocean. It was all very idealic and allowed you to forget about real life for the duration of the film.

My 5yr old daughter also enjoyed it and was not bored in the slightest compared to seeing other films like Bolt or Monsters vs Aliens, which although visually were a lot more full on tended to not hold my daughters attention so much. In fact she asked no questions at all about what was going on in the film. She just accepted it.

My advice live a little forget the normal Disney fare (of course Disney have Ponyo in the arsenal) and let go and slip into the world of Ponyo. You will not feel the 101mins.

All change in my life - Back to work with a bang

Two weeks of work under my belt now. I am working at a local regional IT service provider. An excellent employer with a great team working for it. And I have been working hard there hence the lack of updates. I will try and rectify this over the forthcoming weeks.

What has been happening in my life in the last two weeks? Well lots but a couple of things worth reportin

The Hurt Locker

Well one non work highlight was that I managed to see "The Hurt Locker" at the cinema (using Orange Wednesday) discount before it came of any of the 5 local cinemas. It fact it annoyed me that a film that has been critically acclaimed and talked so highly, has a very interesting female director is on 1 cinema for what looked like 1 week. Sad!!!! Very sad. Luckily for us the queue to get to the box office was for "The Final Destination" and not this film.

Loaded up with my tea (popcorn, hot dog and diet coke) I sat down with my 2 friends who knew nothing about the film and loosely trusted my judgement. 2hrs later we walked out and they were agog with praise and spend the entire trip home discussing the film.

Having now had the discussion with mates and then listening/reading to Mark Kermode and a few other reviews I can boil it down a little.

1. The film is good, in fact it is great! It is not far off one of the best films of the year so far.
2. Its directed by Katherine Bigelow (pictured above) she who did Point Break and Strange Days amongst others. Those were quality films and for that fact alone this film should be on your list of films to watch.
3. This is not a film about the Iraq war or the conflict in Iraq or bomb disposal. Its about a man and his drive and a passion for the adrenalin rush that his job provides. The film does not delve even slightly into the politics of the Iraq war and the rights and wrongs of the whole conflict in the Middle East region.
4. Its beautifully shot and storyline keeps you on edge throughout the entire running time. Added to this the actual subject matter is nerve racking and I found myself through most of the film on edge and absolutely situationally putting myself in the place of the characters and thinking what would I do?
5. The film has no famous actors in the lead roles so you are not detracted from the story by looking and thinking about the star in the film. Having said that Guy Pearce (Neighbours), Ralph Fiennes (Harry Potter) and Evangeline Lilly (Lost) all appear in the story, but they are not the reason to go watch the film. But all the leads, Jeremy Renner, Anthony Mackie and Brian Geraghty do a sterling job and make best of the characters and are totally believable so you are immersed fully in the film. Each character playing a part of your psyche and playing against it well.

Job done. Another film under the belt in an often kid enforced, time drought of films to watch.

Who Moved My Cheese?

As part of my training I kindly got handed my copy of this sterling book. Its called "Who Moved My Cheese" written by Dr Spencer Johnson.

A great book and in this turbulent time of change it is an oasis and mind calmer and helps the reader ask some difficult questions.

For me personally I related to the book as I have had to deal with a lot of change and potential change and the book gave me clarity to what I was thinking and reassured me of my decisions.

It is an easy read and can be done in 20mins. It is simple but its messages are clear.

The one thing the person that gave me the book asked and indeed the authored requests was that I pass the book onto someone else. Who want its then?

Images used are from IGN and amazon.co.uk with non commecial usuage and with thanks

rec

Just scared myself a little.... ok a lot watching Rec on DVD from Lovefilm.com. Although in Spanish with English Subs, it makes it even more edgy. Several spine tingling moments throughout. 8/10 

Posted via email from Posterous'ing with RolyMo

Bruno - OMG

I like to think of myself as being broad minded. I have grown up watching
movies when I was young. I managed to watch the so called "video nasties" of
the 70's and 80's. I have read a fair amount of horror books. I have grown
up with a group of mates who have been at sometime in their lives "lads" and
we have discussed the usual lads subjects. So I consider myself to have a
thick skin, nothing shocks me and very few films now surprise me. Which in
fact makes me need to switch my brain off when watching most films so I can
enjoy the ride.

Enter Orange Wednesday A great scheme if you have an Orange phone here in the UK.I got a free PAYG
SIM from their website for this exact purpose. On a Wednesday you send an
SMS to 241 and you get a message back with a code. You take the code to the
cinema when purchasing the tickets and you get a 2 for the price of 1
ticket. In this time where the movie industry feel they need to charge some
very high prices for entrance into the cinema (to bolster their pockets and
keep themselves in the ways they were accustomed to). This is a very much
welcomed offer.

This week we used the Orange Wednesday offer to go and see
Bruno. It was a tough call. I actually wanted to see Public Enemies but a poll of
friends swayed towards Bruno. Which is fine I would see either, no problem.

I think Sacha Baron Cohen is a clever man, a new media comedian. The
characters that he creates are brilliant, he manages to capture all aspects
of a person when he creates the character. Borat was proof of this. Bruno
takes this a step further.

Cohen follows the same formula that was employed by his previous characters
and uses his relatively unknown status to interview members of the global
public for shocking outcomes. Bruno takes this to next level far surpassing
the painful and brilliant moments in Borat. I think this is the last time
Cohen can do this mind you.

The first 10mins of Bruno are rather explosive and set you up nicely for the
remainder of the film. I laughed and laughed and laughed throughout the
film, sometimes when others were not. I think sometimes the laughter was
perhaps a laughter of disbelief that someone has actually made a film about
this type of humour or had the balls to tell that particular joke.

I came out the film glad I had seen it, but instantly forgetting the purpose
of the film.

Going back to where I started. Having built a thick skin Bruno still managed
to shock or rather surprise or perhaps both.

Would I go and see it again? Probably!!!
Is it worth watching? Yes
Orange Wednesday? Rocks

Bolt

Up up and away
Originally uploaded by Roly Mo

Yep.
It was half term which is just coming to an end. We can all go back to work or in my case job hunting.

As a special treat as the cinema is quite expensive these days, we went to see Bolt. I am still not convienced that a 4 year old gets these CGI Disney films with the adulty type jokes. I'm sure they will like the toon itself but the subject matter is probably a little bit beyond them. None the less made the Journey to Portsmouth's Vue cinema in Gun Wharf.

After a few unsuitable trailers we got the film and it was basically all ok. Not fantastic as in Toy Story but it was ok. I spent most of the time trying to work out who voiced the hamster "Rhino". I subsequently found out it is Mark Walton http://uk.imdb.com/name/nm0910559/

I would give the film a 3.5/5. Animation brilliant. I did not see the 3D version. Rhino character just perfect mix of cutsy unhinged hero's side kick.

The Picture. O on a flying thing outside the cinema after the film.