Category: TV & Film

Jon Stewart: You can’t say I didn’t warn you

Posted on by Kelly Welles

I’m putting this here.

I don’t want anyone who knows me – whether in real life, via social media or even just as a distant shape in cyberspace – to say they haven’t heard about this or haven’t had the opportunity to watch it.

If you choose not to watch it, that’s fine. That choice is part of the wider principle that Jon Stewart is articulating in this monologue and one I will defend to the best of my abilities.

Be proactive. Or reactive. Think about it first.

Make it a conscious decision to do jackshit.

What it feels like for a girl

Posted on by Kelly Welles

 
The is the most glorious and realistic representation of what it feels like to be a sixteen-year-old girl with friends that I’ve ever seen in a movie.

The film is Céline Sciamma’s Girlhood. The actors were cast from street auditions.

You need to watch it immediately. If not before.

Mad Max: Fury Road (AKA Wacky Races for the Xbox Generation)

Posted on by Kelly Welles

maaaad

Tom Hardy has got a hand fork stuck to his face.

I realise it’s been an awfully long time since I’ve been to the cinema to see a mainstream action film (yes, I’m a movie snob, but in my defence I have ‘fessed up to that particular corner of wankery in previous posts) and I fully expected to have missed some developments, but seriously.

Is this a thing now?

Continue reading “Mad Max: Fury Road (AKA Wacky Races for the Xbox Generation)” →

‘Drain the Titanic’: A Sentimental Journey Through The Darkest Depths

Posted on by Kelly Welles

Titanic

I was obsessed with the Titanic when I was a kid.

I had a hardback book about it, passages of which I could recite verbatim, and a National Geographic video of Robert Ballard’s 1985 expedition to locate the wreck, which I watched until the modern day footage was as grainy as the images they took from the bottom of the Atlantic.

Suffice to say, after the novelty of a seven-year-old babbling on about impact zones, deep sea pressure changes and steel corrosion had worn off, my parents started locking me in my bedroom when we had guests.

Continue reading “‘Drain the Titanic’: A Sentimental Journey Through The Darkest Depths” →

Big Brother: The Young & the Desperate

Posted on by Kelly Welles
Embed from Getty Images

As bad habits go, writing  about appalling television sits on the social niceties scale alongside blowing one’s nose on the curtains.

Not only does the act provoke outrage and derision at the time, but everyone feels inexplicably dirty and wrong for a long time afterwards.

Continue reading “Big Brother: The Young & the Desperate” →

Hey Jeremy! What are you rebelling against?

Posted on by Kelly Welles

clarkson

So Jeremy Clarkson is in trouble again.

The BBC’s swaggering, denim disturbing cash cow has been suspended from Top Gear, pending an inquiry into allegations that he “punched a producer”. Clarkson, whose list of offences during his tenure on the show is almost  as long as the Lap Time leaderboard, was on his last warning after footage of him reciting a racially offensive verson of a nursery rhyme was released into the public domain.

At the time of writing, 241,030 people have signed a petition demanding his reinstatement.

Continue reading “Hey Jeremy! What are you rebelling against?” →

American Sniper: I’m Not Angry, Just Disappointed

Posted on by Kelly Welles

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You’ve probably got an opinion on this, whether you’ve seen it or not.

Nominated for six Oscars, including Best Picture, American Sniper is a Clint Eastwood directed, unapologetic tribute to the heroism of war.

It tells the (true) story of Chris Kyle, a sniper who, with 160 confirmed kills, is generally considered to be the deadliest marksman in US history. It has also been heavily criticised for being an ironically short sighted examination of masculinity, patriotism and modern warfare.

It stars a bulked up, monosyllabic Bradley Cooper, Sienna Miller, the terrorist riddled, gun battle pock marked streets of Iraq and a shit load of dust.

An award magnet, if you like. Continue reading “American Sniper: I’m Not Angry, Just Disappointed” →

Movie Review: Nightcrawler. Dead Inside

Posted on by Kelly Welles

Nightcrawler-2

So Hollywood has spotted their awkward boy’s potential.

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Stinson Hunter: The Exception That Proves The Rule

Posted on by Kelly Welles

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Stinson Hunter is an inevitability in a world completely blindsided by the power of technology.

Fulfilling the criteria of your average Daily Mail reader’s idea of a ‘chav’ – broken home, jail time, cap, sportswear, bad tattoos, lip piercing, a confidence that far exceeds his station in life – he spends his time sitting silently in the corner of 18+ websites in the guise of a young girl, waiting for someone to approach.

When they do, and be under no illusion, they do; a former Metropolitan Police office who worked in child protection doing more or less what Stinson is doing claimed he had over 2000 approaches from men, he advises them of his ‘age’, usually between 11 and 15. Some move on.

Many don’t.

Continue reading “Stinson Hunter: The Exception That Proves The Rule” →