This week, I didn't really watch any new stuff, but I did re-watch Lincoln and a few episodes from Season 3 of Angel.

Funnily enough, in my film scoring class we were scoring a deleted scene from Atonement this week, so I actually had a listen to the score. I thought it was quite good, though what I've seen of the movie looks terrible (not a Joe Wright fan).

I simply don't get the constant, endless criticism that Whedon isn't a "cinematic" director. When I saw the Avengers in cinemas, it felt plenty cinematic. Additionally, Whedon has a strong visual style (not just in the gimmick episodes either), and you easily can pick him out of a lineup of when he directs episodes of…

I've been re-watching Angel recently (just got up to S3). My take-away so far has been that S1 is nowhere near as bad as people tend to say it is. I remembered it being fairly strong, particularly as I watched Angel before Buffy, and it mostly held up. S2 was fantastic, and the show was pretty much firing on all…

This week I watched Once. I enjoyed it, though in terms of the songs they clearly blew their wad with the first one, which was substantially better than the others (I can definitely see why it won an Oscar). I liked a lot of the detail and charm of the film, though it was very obviously done on the cheap, and the…

How can a show about a pub quiz be soapy?

Sports is definitely the not-so-secret key to doing well at a pub quiz. However, you definitely also need to have a woman on the team (or at least someone who knows something about fashion and gossip). In NZ, it also pays to have someone who knows about religion or the Royal family as well.

This week I watched Short Term 12, The Road, and Gunga Din.

I had the exact opposite thing happen. Me and my brother convinced our dad to go see Wolf of Wall Street on Boxing Day, but he hadn't seen the trailers and thought it was going to be a pretentious, Oscar-bait drama. After about a minute, he realised it was a comedy and ended up loving the movie even more than we did.

As far as I remember, the first 80-100 issues were pretty good. I think I stopped reading shortly after, because it started really obviously spinning its wheels.

It was a pretty wobbly kick, though they pick the best possible angle in the film to show it from (Spider-cam). Personally I'd love to see a film about the Cruden vs. Barrett battle going on right now. It'd be like Saracen vs. McCoy in S3 of Friday Night Lights.

This week I watched The Kick, The Wedding Banquet, Sense and Sensibility, Time after Time and The Abyss.

I just looked up turducken. Has anyone had it, and could explain what it's like?

I've met people who speak like that (including myself, sometimes). It helps to have a few drinks first.

The make-up was definitely impressive on the Beast, though the performance left a little to be desired.

Well, it was the final week of the NZ Film Festival, and I watched a lot of movies.

It sounds like a gender-flipped version of Brigadoon, with the singing replaced by time travel and extra griminess. I'll probably watch a couple of episodes…

I just read the Turnip-Man one, actually. It was pretty good.

Some more films at the New Zealand Film Festival, some of which I have fairly controversial opinions on.

It is hand-held (or at least shoulder-mounted), but it's actually not that shaky and seems very carefully planned.