Steve

16 December 2013-12-16

2022-11-212013-12-14 by Steve

Emma Roberts, Jennifer Aniston, Will Poulter and Jason Sudeikis in We're the Millers

Out in the UK this week We’re the Millers (Warner, cert 15, Blu-ray/DVD) Having turned up in small roles in good films (say, Friends with Money), in big roles in bad films (The Bounty Hunter), Jennifer Aniston finally makes a film in which she is a star and it is good and funny. She plays the poledancer pretending to be married to smalltime weed seller Jason Sudeikis, so they can smuggle a shitload of marijuana over from Mexico into the US, posing as an average family riding around in an RV. Along for the ride (and a cut of the cash) are street hustler Emma Roberts and dweeb Will Poulter. It’s basically your … Read more

Venus

2023-10-292013-12-14 by Steve

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 15 December Soviet spacecraft Venera 7 lands on Venus, 1970 On this day in 1970, the Soviet Union landed a spacecraft on Venus. The Venera 7 had been launched from Earth on 17 August 1970 and arrived in the proximity of Venus nearly four months later. At this point the spacecraft began its descent, retaining the rocket that had powered it to Venus to use as a heat shield until the atmosphere was dense enough for the use of a parachute, at which point the rocket was jettisoned. At 60km up the parachute deployed, but it failed. The probe hit the … Read more

George Washington

2023-10-292013-12-13 by Steve

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 14 December George Washington dies, 1799 On this day in 1799, George Washington died. George Washington was the first president of the USA, a commander in chief of the army in the war of independence and was also one of the Founding Fathers, the group who signed the Declaration of Independence, launched the new country into a revolutionary war, and then drafted the Constitution. His presidency was marked by attempts to promote the federal government and national institutions, to get taxation on a fair basis, to avoid wars in foreign lands, to pay down the national debt and to use the … Read more

Mary Poppins

2023-10-292013-12-12 by Steve

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 13 December Dick Van Dyke born, 1925 On this day in 1925, Richard Wayne Van Dyke was born. As Dick Van Dyke he has been entertaining people since the Second World War, when he was a radio announcer. Since then he’s been an actor, Sunday school teacher, radio station owner, dancer, singer and keen amateur computer graphics man. More famous and well loved than his CV might suggest, Van Dyke’ imprint on the cultural consciousness has been made by a film and a TV series. The film is Mary Poppins, in which Van Dyke plays Bert, the chimney sweep with an … Read more

Play Misty for Me

2023-10-292013-12-11 by Steve

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 12 December Marconi receives the first transatlantic message, 1901 On this day in 1901, Guglielmo Marconi, one of the pioneers of long-distance radio transmission, finally proved that radio waves could travel really long distances. In 1894 he had started work on “wireless telegraphy” (sending telegrams without the need for wires, via Morse code) when only 20 years old, using his butler as a lab assistant – this was the butt end of the age of the gentleman scientist. He had soon worked out how to make a bell ring on one side of his room, wirelessly from the other. Impressed, his … Read more

Nebraska

2023-10-292013-12-10 by Steve

Staggering along under a weight of folksiness, much like its old-guy hero is staggering along on his beat up legs, Alexander Payne’s latest movie is sweet and wry but let’s not all get too excited. The film certainly doesn’t. Bruce Dern is the old guy, an amnesiac oldster with a “beer isn’t drinking” drink problem who reckons he’s won some obviously fake mailout sweepstake – “you could already have won a million dollars” kind of thing. With nothing else to live for, and getting under the feet of his wife (June Squibb), Woody decides he’s going to get to Nebraska any old how to pick up his winnings, even if it means walking. … Read more

The Notorious Bettie Page

2023-10-292013-12-10 by Steve

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 11 December Bettie Page dies, 2008 On this day in 2008, a woman who had devoted the bulk of her life to Christian causes died, aged 85. But for a while in her 1950s heyday, Bettie Page had been “Queen of Pinups”. She left behind a legacy and a look that can be seen all over contemporary culture, from Beyoncé, Katy Perry and Dita von Teese on down, to wherever cute girls play cute. A bright girl at school, and a member of the debating team, she was married and divorced by the age of 24, then set off to find … Read more

Mud

2023-10-292013-12-09 by Steve

Tye Sheridan, Jacob Lofland and Matthew McConaughey in Mud

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 10 December Huckleberry Finn published, 1884 On this day in 1884, Mark Twain published Huckleberry Finn. It was the second book to feature the vagabond child of a vagrant drunkard father, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer being the first. Huck Finn would appear in two more short books, Tom Sawyer Abroad and Tom Sawyer, Detective, but only as the narrator. Huckleberry Finn is a romantic character, the free spirit not bound by the rules of bourgeois life – hence nice kid Tom Sawyer’s attraction to him. He was based on a Mississippi character called Tom Blankenship, whom Twain was friendly with … Read more

The Deep (aka Djúpið)

2023-10-292013-12-08 by Steve

Ólafur Darri Ólafsson (left) in The Deep

A movie for every day of the year – a good one 9 December Clarence Birdseye born, 1886 On this day in 1886, one of the greats of the modern food industry was born. The man who could be considered to be the real Captain Birdseye came into the world in Brooklyn, New York, the sixth of nine children. Clarence didn’t come from a privileged background and when he grew up he struggled to pay his college fees. He ended up dropping out and in his early 20s wound up being a taxidermist, where the standing problem is how to keep the animal fresh while it’s being worked on. By the age of … Read more

9 December 2013-12-09

2022-11-212013-12-07 by Steve

See what I mean about mood? James Wan's The Conjuring

Out in the UK This Week The Conjuring (Warner, cert 15, Blu-ray/DVD) A family living out in the boonies is terrorised by a demon spirit in this moody horror film directed by James Wan and written by twin brothers Chad and Carey Hayes. The Hayes brothers are in their 50s but Wan wasn’t even born when The Exorcist was released in 1973. But he’s definitely seen the film; The Conjuring is an exercise in Exorcist atmospherics – all rosaries, Latin and vomit. Vera Farmiga and Patrick Wilson play the weird earnest, hucksterish exorcists, Farmiga deliberately going for Ellen Burstyn in her performance, Wilson wisely staying away from any suggestion of channelling Max Von Sydow. … Read more