I felt the plot tied really well together. The initially unlinked subplots came together nicely and not in a way that felt rushed on unnatural. Clearly the writer of the novel this was based on is very talented and I have a real desire to read some of his work. The majestic outdoor scenes were filmed in my native Scotland which I was pleased to recognise without having to use IMDB. The acting was great (especially Robert De Niro in an unusual role) with a mostly-British cast and the CGI really helped me to get engrossed in the world.

I find it impressive when fantasy or sci-fi films introduce you to a completely new realm whilst introducing a decent number of characters and still having a great plot which keeps you engrossed.

I’d really recommend you see this film if you haven’t already. If you have, what did you think?

Another bonus from the film was seeing the trailer for Philip Pullman’s ‘The Golden Compass’ film adaption. I’m definately seeing it the CGI looked incredible, the best I’ve seen in a long time. It also had fighting polar bears. Polar bears kick ass but armored polar bears? How can you not watch a film with armored polar bears?

I found the film really enjoyable and thought provoking. The camera work was bordering on beautiful, loads of still shots perpendicular to flat, bland surfaces helping you to focus in on the characters. The acting was convincing enough but it was the direction and story that really dragged me in and made me think.

I find it completely abhorrent that in the supposedly civilized world of the 21st century politicians are willing to have people tortured to fight an invisible enemy. I find it doubly so that my country is willing to have these prison flights landed and refueled on their soil and allow their citizens to be sent to places like Camp X-Ray to be tortured and abused without trial only to be simply released without any compensation on their innocence being decided.

Coming out the film made me sick to my stomach of the way the world is going as of late. Average people don’t seem to care that their liberties are being revoked and their country killing hundreds of thousands abroad in an illegal war we entered under deliberately false pretenses.

The thing that saddens me the most is I truly have no idea what I can do. When faced with the power of governments, foreign wars and a populace who neither seems to notice or care I feel impotent and powerless.

Does anyone else have any thoughts on helping with some of these problems? I’d be interested in hearing your comments.

I just want to (geekingly) declare my love for you, Lindsay, across the internet. Happy 5 years which I hope are just the beginning of many more.

I’ve now moved both my laptop and desktop to the respective ~arch branches of Gentoo, and both are running fine. I remember a few years ago when I started using Gentoo, using the ~arch branch was suicide, perhaps just due to my inexperience, but now, maybe once a week something breaks, I need to check or file a bug report and roll-back to an existing version, but all that takes me now less than 5 minutes, and I feel I’m doing my bit to make Gentoo a more stable distribution overall.

There’s a lot of fuss been kicked up lately about the whole Novell-Microsoft deal. Basically, it seems they’ve got in bed together, with Microsoft calling a cease-fire on patents with Novell, but warns the other Linux distributions won’t be so lucky. This is a bit of a bummer for me, as Novell was a company I was quite keen on working for, but this is somewhat called into question with recent events. Also, it just seems like more FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) from Microsoft, as, if Linux really infringed so many of their patents, I would be interested to know why they have been yet to file any suits.

The whole SCO debacle has shown that Linux has powerful friends and users, such as IBM, whose patent portfolio threatens Microsoft with MAD if they decide to start suing. It’s also shown that claims of patent infringement seem to be false.

Irregardless, Linux isn’t going anywhere any time soon. Even if Microsoft and pals decide to sue the major distributions, it will stay underground and people will keep hacking on it regardless. It’s a good operating system, and no-one will convince me or many thousands or others otherwise.

Oh my goodness me.
That was a GOOD film. I don’t think I’ve come out a cinema that happy ever before. Some of my favourite films include The Shawshank Redemption, Heat, Fight Club, The Game, Platoon and Spinal Tap, but sadly, I saw none of the above at the cinema. I however, last night, did see The Departed.

It was good. Really good.

I’ve become a bit of a snob lately with cinema, and actually watch for the camera work, acting, script, body language and other things, before deciding how good a film was. Everything in this film, bar a few regional accents, was flawless. A dazzling array of good actors, Martin Sheen, Mark Wahlberg, Matt Damon, Leonardo Di Caprio (who, usually, I hate), Alec Baldwin and Jack Nicolson make this film a real treat to watch. Scorsese’s direction really sucks you into the plot. You care about the characters, you care about the outcome, and you are left gobsmacked when the film unexpectedly twists and turns.

If you haven’t seen this film yet, please do. Even if you’re a girl and normally just watch romantic comedies, this film is very good. I honestly think if you can’t enjoy this, your taste in cinema is not worthy. Just watch it. In fact, stop reading, book a ticket and go now. Unless its night time, then go to bed and see it as soon as possible.

I reckon I’ll see it again this week. This film is a real classic, and will be held up with Heat, GoodFellas and The Godfather Trilogy of how to make excellent films. If it doesn’t win at least one Oscar, I’ll do a forfeit of choice for the first person to call me on it.

Rating: 10/10 (No, really!)

Ronin
Bought this on DVD the other day, purely because the cast looked sweet. A really cool action movie, with some nice twists, and one of the first car chases that I’ve found generally exciting (normally they bore me stupid). A nice little twist at the end, with my only regret being that the legend Sean Bean wasn’t in it for longer.
Rating: 7/10

The Devil Wears Prada
To call this a “chick flick” would be to do it injustice. The only fair description would be the worst film ever made.
The script was poor, the characters one dimensional and either loathsome or boring. The topic matter was pretentious and it wasn’t even funny, either to laugh at or with. It’s the worst film I’ve ever seen by a long way. I’d rather drink my own urine than watch this again.
Rating: 0/10

The Last Kiss
I was pleasantly surprised by this film. It wasn’t predictable, wasn’t girly, wasn’t cliched. The acting, I thought, was great, with Zach Braff giving a really authentic performance. The camerawork and directing had really good attention to detail, it was really like getting into the characters lives. I would really recommend this film, even if the title puts you off.
Rating: 8/10

Babylon 5
Not a film, I know, but I’ve just finished watching the first series with my flatmate. I bought the >40 DVD boxset this summer, and its amazing. I loved it before, and I love it even more now.
It’s quite simply breathtaking. The story arc weaves and turns, with all 5 seasons planned out perform the first episode was filmed. You can see pointers and references to future events, and its great watching everything unfold again. It was pitched as “Scifi for adults”, and the description is more than fair. Even if you aren’t into scifi, I challenge you to watch more than a few episodes and not get hooked.
Rating: 9.5/10