Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Odyssey-Christopher-Nolan/
dp/0571403387

On Friday my youngest son treated us to a trip to the cinema to see the new version of Homer's Odyssey. We couldn't get into the i-max but I don't think we missed much as the Vue version was clear, large and loud in a packed cinema. I tried to read the Odyssey many years ago and can't honestly remember how much I covered but most of the stories were familiar and Nolan seems to have been fairly faithful but switching back and for timewise to keep up interest. There were more fistfights and more swearing than in the original I guess in a macho action film that kept interest to the end but perhaps lacked a focus.

Project Hail Mary

I went to see Project Hail Mary in the cinema with two of my sons recently. It is a science fiction film based on a novel by Andy Weir. It presents a dystopian future that is rescued by an ordinary hero (Ryan Gosling). Quite a long film, I enjoyed it for the most part. Some laughs, some sentiment, some sentimentality. There are a few Easter eggs (eg a reference to Close Encounters, a voice cameo from Meryl Streep, etc). The lead character is called Grace and the echoes of and contrasts to Christ's redemption are almost inevitable and there is one reference to God in the film. (Catholic references seem more likely than Protestant ones, I guess.)

Day Off Week 4 2026

It was a typical reading day yesterday. I carried on reading Nick Wallis's book on the Post Office scandal on my kindle and, over coffee, completed Ian Shaw's excellent on book on Christians and slavery which is highly recommended (more on that later). (I did have a day off the Tuesday before too when I finished Caleb Morrell's A light on the hill - more about that anon). In the evening we went to the cinema to see Hamnet. The film is about Shakespeare's family life. The first part of the film, set almost exclusively in Stratford, is okay but nothing special. (It also includes an unhelpful and unnecessary scene be warned). It is in the latter part of the film when the focus switches to London and the famous play that things take off and we are presented with a very moving and interesting sidelight on things. While taking the bare facts Maggie O'Farrell has used a her imagination to well to present a compelling drama. Ended the day with a bit of TV including the News.

10 Metareferences in the movie Elf

I have just finished watching the movie Elf as I do at this time of the year each year. I was struck by one particular scene where Buddy the elf looks out from a bridge on a snowy night and how it references James Stewart in the Frank Capra film It's a wonderful life. Others have noticed similar things and the movie is described by some critics as being a "meta film" in the way it acknowledges and plays with audience expectations of the Christmas movie genre, tying familiar tropes together to create an original story wrapped in a "holiday classic bow".

1. It's A Wonderful Life Buddy's bridge scene references George Bailey contemplating his purpose in life.
2. Miracle on 34th Street Buddy's trip to Gimbel's is reminiscent of the scenes in Macy's. Gimbel's was Macy's store rival.
3. Edward Scissorhands Buddy makes snowflakes like Edward. He doesn't have the same tools but he achieves the same result.
4. A Christmas Story Buddy's snowball fight is a reference to this film. Buddy saves Michael from school bullies just like Ralphie.
5. A Christmas Story The Ralphie actor has a cameo. Peter Billingsley plays Buddy's elf supervisor Ming Ming.
6. Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer Leon The Snowman resembles Rudolph's Sam. The snowman Leon and Sam are both mentors to elves
7. Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer Buddy's elf costume recalls Hermey the mistfit elf's costume.
8. The Santa Clause Elf plays on the theme of nonbelievers being converted by the irrefutable evidence of the Christmas spirit and Santa Claus's existence, with a normal man being thrust into the North Pole environment.
9. The Christmas Star Edward Asner plays Santa again not a crook this time but the real thing.
10. National lampoon's Christmas Vacation Once again there are antics with an oversized Christmas tree.

These metareferences are sometimes referred to as Easter eggs. So Easter at Christmas!

Day Off Week 48 2025

Nearly a week gone by since my day off but I do want to record it. I won't really be having one this week. Four things - 1. Reading. I read a large chunk of Dianarama, a new book about the infamous interview and the facts surrounding it. Finished that now. 2/3. Watching. First, the new Frankenstein on Netflix, which I enjoyed. Director Guillermo Del Toro takes the Mary Shelley idea and does his own take. It's a great film (apart from some of the cgi) but misses a few tricks that a Christian worldview might provide help in. Great pre-Christmas film with all that snow. (I now recall that I have also seen his Shape of Water but not his Pinocchio, which I met get on to). Second, a couple of episodes of Prisoner 951 (there are four altogether). It is interesting becasue the family whose story is related lives nearby (I have met her) and we have a lot of Iranians in the church. 4. Eleri came home with a coat for me, from Costco. She's so kind.

Nuremberg

Popped to the cinema this afternoon to see the film Nuremberg. Great acting, powerful drama and touching on such a crucial moment in world history the film had everything in its favour. It sligktly annoys me that we tend to get the humanist version of events as opposed to anything Christian. I have read books on Nuremberg by chaplains but this film gives no hint that there were chaplains present or that there was a spiritual dimension to what happend at all. Rather, we focus on a psychiatrist who was there and who wrote a commercially unsuccessful book on his time. With that caveat, great stuff. Ironically, the psychiatrist seems to have worked out that the Nazis were just normal human beings gone wrong not preternatural monsters. Warning - it includes what I assume is genuine footage of the dead and dying in the camps. Two past oscar winners on show and two past nominees I understand. Only one light moment I noticed - two doctors fight and an officer berated them - you are mental health professionals! 

Downton Abbey The Grand Finale

I forgot to mention last week that we got along to the cinema  to see the thrid anf dinal Downton film. As ever it was very good and managed not to ruin the franchise with anything ill-judged even tough by now it is 1930 in Downton land. The combination if fine actors, what I presume is meticullous research (although I'm not surprised some have found errors already) and great writing makes it a pleasurable watch. It is also interesting that 1930 sensibilities would make having a divorced woman in your home a scandal while Noel Coward was perfectly acceptable. I'm nt a Downton fan but it is good, clever stuff there is no denying.

K Pop Demon Hunters

Last Saturday I sat down with some of my grand children to watch the film K Pop Demon Hunters. I was interested to watch as the film is quite popular at present. It was a coherent good v evil story with nice pop songs and one or two twists that it is easy to see winning young hearts and minds.

A Real Pain

The other thing we did with Gwion and Lydia yesterday was to watch a film. Being film buffs they had watched it before but gladly watched it again. A real pain has garnered loads of awards since its release in 2024. It stars the director Jesse Eisenberg and Kieran Culkin (not Jewish apparently - I would not have guessed). Two mismatched cousins reunite for a Jewish heritage tour to Poland in honour of their late grandmother. Old tensions resurface against the backdrop of their family history. Too much swearing for me but a very interesting and sometimes funny film that is very thought provoking on the Jewish question, mental health adn peronality and more broadly. I'm not sure if it is possible to think straight about matters Jewish unless you have a good Bible grasp. Glad to have seen the film. Great title.

Death of John MacArthur

People will be beginning to hear about the death of the great preacher and commentator John MacArthur, great loss. My connections with John MacArthur and the Masters Seminary. etc, are almost non-existent but I am a talking head in that documentary film Grace To You made (The Essential Church) and in 2007 I met him when he spoke at the Banner Conference in Leicester and I appreciated his ministy at that time.

Tom Drion, a MacArthur man and now pastor of a MacArthur church here in London was at the conference and was then trying to get together some good brief audio-visual material for us on the Internet. He very kindly (though perhaps misguidedly) thought I could help and o he invited me over to his room (a student room in the university accommodation) where he had a makeshift studio set up. I remember his giving me choice of subjects then siting me in front of the camera where I burbled for a minute or two until Tom announced that he could see someone else he had asked heading to the room.

That someone else was, of course, John MacArthur, who had been staying off campus in order to keep up with his various regular duties withe Grace To You. So there are four us in a tiny room - the great and always immaculately dressed John MacArthur, his minder, Tom and me. I am briefly introduced to Dr MacArthur then he sits down and speaks clearly, succinctly and edifyingly into the camera on whatever subject Tom gave him. Of course, he had done it many times before and knew how to seize the moment to best advantage. So impressive.

When he had gone, Tom gave me another go but if anything I was worse again. How thankful we should be that God gave us such a gifted man for so long.

The Ballad of Willis Island

My wife and I enjoyed this new film with Carey Mulligan at the cinema last Saturday. It's a nice gentle film about music and fame and money and love and art and integrity. We really enjoyed it.

Penguin Lessons

Yesterday we went to the cinema to see the charming "The Penguin Lessons". Steve Coogan is the main actor. Jonathan Pryce is also in it. It is based on a 2015 memoir by Tom Michell, a British teacher who taught at a boys' boarding school in Argentina in the 1970s (when he was in his twenties; the fact Coogan is 58 didn't really matter). Michell finds a penguin soaked with oil on a beach in Uruguay and takes it back to the school, where it becomes a popular pet. The message is the usual positive side of humanism, the main character being a bit of a waster with a sad past (fictional addition) who perhaps does some good despite himself. It's a 12a for good reason but is worth watching if you can cope with the periodic swearing. The penguin is brilliant. They mostly used real animals apparently but there was a little jiggery-pokery. (This is at least the third Argentinian-themed film for Welsh actor Jonathan Pryce, who previously played Argentinian president Juan Perón in Evita, as my wife pointed out to me, and also Pope Francis II (who was Argentinian) in The Two Popes.

Conclave

I forgot to mention that I'd been to see Conclave in the cinema the other day. Based on a Robert Harris novel, it takes the entirely factual idea of a papal conclave as the backdrop to an entirely fictional inside account of one where, after various occurrences a new Pope is chosen. Without giving too much away it confirms modern liberal prejudices as it works its way through the story. Some very good acting, I guess.

Complete Unknown

We went last night to see the new biopic about the legendary Bob Dylan. The film is very interesting and worth watching. At one point we see Dylan in a church leafing through a Bible but this is not about the period when he professed faith and scandalised everyone with his evangelical fervour but about those early days from his arrival in New York as a complete unknown to his famous appearance at the Newport Folk Festival in 1965 when, horrors, he played an electric set to the bewildered audience. It is in this wonderful closing scene that we get into the area of poetic licence. We have someone in the film calling Dylan a Judas but that I'm sure didn't happen until a year or so later in Manchester. We also have Johnny Cash backstage urging Dylan back on for a final acoustic number. Cash was in Newport in 1964 but not 1965. How can film makers justify playing fast and loose with the truth? The broader truth is that Dylan was considered a Judas and Johnny Cash was a great encourager of the new electric phase. In a brief and passing media like film sometimes such things need to be done. It also provides nerds with something to talk about. Bob Dylan is an enigmatic character and this film does nothing to dispel that enigma but it does give you some material to work with.

10 musical biopics of recent years

1. 2021 Respect, Aretha Franklin (Jennifer Hudson [older] Skye Dakota Turner [young])
2. The United States vs. Billie Holiday, Billie Holiday (Andra Day)
3. Elvis, Elvis Presley (Austin Butler)
4. 2022 Wanna dance with somebody, Whitney Houston (Naomi Ackie)
5. George & Tammy, Tammy Wynette (Jessica Chastain) George Jones (Michael Shannon)
6. 2023 Maestro, Leonard Bernstein (Bradley Cooper) Felicia Montealegre (Carey Mulligan)
7. 2024 Maria, Maria Callas (Angelina Jolie [older] Angelina Papadopoulou [young])
8. One Love, Bob Marley (Kingsley Ben-Adir)
9. Back to Black, Amy Winehouse (Marisa Abela)
10. A Complete Unknown, Bob Dylan (Timothée Chalamet)

I have only seen four of these but would be happy to watch them all.

New Beatles Related Films

I have recently watched two new films related to The Beatles, one a drama and one a documentary. The Midas Man is a biopic I saw on Amazon Prime about the life of Brian Epstein, who managed The Beatles. Production has had some troubles since the start of production in 2021 but finally got there in 2023. The film tracks how Brian Epstein rose to prominence by managing a series of popular artists including The Beatles, Cilla Black and Gerry and the Pacemakers before his sudden death in 1967 at the age of 32. It has to deal with some murky material and does that without sensationalising. In many ways Epstein led a very sad life and this is no adcert for the homosexual lifestyle as far as I can see. The actors who play The Beatles do very well and shine. It is interesting to get some of the background. Epstein's great gift was to sopot this music and bring ti to the world's attention.

The Scorsese produced documentary, directed by David Tedesch is on Disney+ and is a cut above the biopic. It documents the cultural impact of the Beatles on the USA in the aftermath of their first three-week visit to the country in February, 1964, which included their historic first performances on The Ed Sullivan Show. It includes archival footage from the Beatlemania era. Scorses and Tedeschi did a orevious documentary on George Harrison, which I have not seen. The film features footage shot by Albert and David Maysles originally for the 1964 documentary What's Happening! The Beatles in the U.S.A., digitally restored. New interviews with McCartney and Starr were also filmed. Footage of the Beatles' February 1964 performances on The Ed Sullivan Show and at the Washington Coliseum has also been restored, with audio from these performances remixed by Giles Martin using de-mixing technology developed by Peter Jackson's WingNut Films and previously used for Beatles releases on the 2022 reissue of Revolver and the 2023 reissue of 1962–1966. A soundtrack album from the film has been released digitally and on streaming platforms. The album contains studio recordings by the Beatles of songs featured in the film, as well as the original versions of tracks covered by the Beatles (eg the Chuck Berry recording of "Roll Over Beethoven," the Little Richard recording of "Long Tall Sally"). The compilation also includes a striking cover of "Yesterday" performed by Smokey Robinson and the Miracles on The Ed Sullivan Show in 1968.

I loved some of the talking head material. For example

David Lynch

Music is one of the most fantastic things. Almost like fire, and water, and air. It's like a thing. And it does so much. It does a thing for the intellect, it does a thing for the emotions. And a certain kind of music can swell the heart to almost burst. Tears of happiness flow out of your eyes. You can't believe the beauty that comes. And it comes from these notes.

 Sananda Meitraya

There was where the foundation of my faith laid, in the power of music to transform lives. And I feel that as a son of the Beatles, I owe them a significant portion of why I'm here. I should also curse those b*tches because it's also so much suffering that we artists go through because of Pied Pipers like the Beatles, who say, "Come on, come on, come on. You can do it." The elixir that they put together is so profound, it wasn't just about the songs. It was the energy that the songs were carrying forward.

One Love

May be biopic (I said bi-opic for years but it shoud be bio-pic, of course) is my favourite genre of movie. I've seen three in the last little while (Maestro, One Life, One Love). I saw One Love in the cinema last week and really enjoyed it. Critics have been divided but I thought it did what it set out to do. How accurate it was I don't know. What I noticed was how brief Marley's life was (he died at 36) and how idealistic he was. Rastafarian beliefs really hold no water but I woould guess Christians come across like that to some. In the end it was great music that put Bob Marley so high in people's estimation. What his impact was otherwise it is hard to say.

Day Off Week 7 2024

A good day on Tuesday. I was going to read about Post-impressionists but my copy had been damaged at some point before I bought it so I had to bin that and turn to the one on Expressionists (Schiele, Munch, etc). Didn't enjoy them as much as the impressionists. I worked on one or two of my other blogs, including this one here. In the afternoon Eleri and I went to see One Life the olm about Nicholas Winterton and his rescue of children from Prague in the thirties. Very moving. When we came out of the cinema we heard of the death of Steve Wright, who we have both enjoyed over the years. An emotional moment after such a film. No pancakes today but we enjoyed hoe made burgers and then watched the last in the current series of BBC's Silent Witness. We enjoy it but it is a funny old series with more quirks than Quirky Mcquirky.

Day Off Week 6 2024

Tuesday was taken up with some traditional activites such as reading about art, buying cheese, having coffee, etc. I spent a while in West Hampstead (browsing the charity shops, reading in the library, having lunch in Chipotle). The art book I read was the one in the Parragon series on The Impressionists. I also read more of the books I mentioned last week. The cheese I wanted (stinking bishop) was not in West Hampstead but I was able to get it in Hampstead. Had a nice chat with my sister on the 'phone there. Eleri out all day and evening. In the evening, I watched the film Maestro about Leonard Bernstein. Like so many geniuses he was rather self-centred and hard to live with and not someone you would want to know. Felt rather ill towards the end of the day, my sinuses I would guess (it felt like toothache).

Day Off Week 48 2023

In week 47 we were down in South Wales for two days with the family but this week it was back to the more normal arrangement. Dale Ralph Davis's latest book on the Psalms (38-51) is now out and is well up to scratch. I am enjoying it immensely and finding it very helpful. There has been a lot of publicity about Ridley Scott's film Napooleon so I decided to go see it at our nearby Imax cinema. It does merit such a viewing and kept me gripped throughout. How accurate it is is debatable and we could have done without some of the material included that make ita 15. Nevertheless, you get an idea of the impact Napoleon made in his time at least. In the evning I watched a further episode of the current Shetland which seems t be thriving despite losing its main character (actually the main character is Shetland itself).