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Most of my posting will be about books, films and music. Some of you may recognise me from other review websites.

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Arts & Humanities > British Literature Book reviews: 1984, by George Orwell: 1 of 25
'1984' is very difficult to define. It can be viewed as a prophetic vision of the future, as pure science fiction, as political commentary or even a tragic love story. Its enduring appeal and its greatness as a novel is due to the fact that all these labels apply. In order to understand the motivation behind writing 1984 we ... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Minority Report: 1 of 6
A film based on a Philip K Dick story, a sci-fi tale with a film noire feel about it, a chilling vision of the near future, where man's freedom is being threatened by technology No I'm not talking about the sci-fi classic Blade Runner but about one of Spielberg's recent offerings Minority Report. The comparisons with Blade R... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Lucky Number Slevin: 1 of 6
In the same way that Guy Ritchie is credited for re-inventing the British crime thriller in this country with Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels' (1998) people like Tarantino with Reservoir Dogs' (1992) and Brian Singer in The Usual Suspects' (1995) did the same for the American genre. These films became the new film noir f... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Memento: 1 of 5
Amid a morass of conventional Hollywood blockbusters all clones of each other featuring inane predictable plots, wasteful special effects and below average acting it is refreshing to think that every so often a filmmaker has the balls to come up with something different and make it into a huge commercial success. Memento is ... More..
Arts & Humanities > Historical Literature Book reviews: Guns, Germs and Steel, by Jared Diamond: 1 of 4
OK, let's get philosophical shall we? Why are we here? Is there life after death? How did it all begin? These can be described as the A-list questions that humans have asked since we developed enough intelligence to stop sitting around picking fleas off each other and think about such things. A slightly less fundamental ques... More..
Arts & Humanities > International Writers & Literature Book reviews: Atonement, by Ian McEwan: 1 of 3
The terms masterpiece, classic, work of genius are so overused these days that they have become little more than anther tool in the armoury of the publisher's PR department. We simply can't tell what the long term effect of a book will be, whether it will still be important decades or centuries from now. Bearing this in mind... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Alien: 4 of 8
There have been lots of horror movies that have used science fiction themes right back to the classic Frankenstein' films of the 1930's or a minor movie classic The Fly' (1958), there have also been plenty of sci-fi films that have used devices borrowed from the horror genre to pep up the plot; mutated plants, animals or peo... More..
Entertainment > Movie Reviews Movie reviews: Flightplan: 3 of 6
Before I start let me confess that I love Jodie Foster (as an actress of course) so any film featuring her doesn't get a totally unbiased review from me. Throughout her career she has shown she is an adaptable and versatile actress who can convince in a variety of roles. She often excels at playing strong and yet vulnerable ... More..
Entertainment > Album Reviews Album reviews: A Pagan Place, by The Waterboys: 1 of 2
What goes around comes around or at least it can seem that way At the end of the 70's the bloated overproduced sound of Prog rock epitomised by bands such as Emerson, Lake and Palmer, Yes and the like was blown away by the short sharp shock of Punk and the return to the 3 minute single. The sound of the music was again minim... More..
Arts & Humanities > American Literature Book reviews: The Secret History, by Donna Tart: 1 of 2
The secret History is Donna Tartt's first novel. Since its publication in 1993 it has become a best seller and it has been critically acclaimed. So is it a great book? No. Let me explain why. THE STORY A young Californian student Richard Papen frustrated at home gets a scholarship to study at Hampden College in an isolated p... More..